The statue of Massasoit by the American sculptor Cyrus Edwin Dallin in Plymouth, Massachusetts, was completed in 1921 to mark the three-hundredth anniversary of the colonists' landing. The sculpture is meant to represent the Pokanoket leader Massasoit welcoming the Pilgrims on the occasion of the first Thanksgiving. The last of Massasoit's line, Wootonekanuske, was invited to the unveiling of this statue in 1921. The following article was published in the New Bedford Mercury in 1921.

 New Bedford, Mercury, Wednesday, September 21,1921

Wootonekanuske, Granddaughter of Massasoit in ninth generation, resented being taken to Plymouth to celebrate the coming of the white men---”King Philip was right.”

“The fandangos at Plymouth this summer were a farce. It was a celebration of the anniversary of the killing of the owners of the New England hills and plains –– the Indians. Why should I have been dragged to Plymouth to celebrate such an event? Massasoit, my grandfather eight times removed, should have killed the so-called Pilgrims instead of helping them. Then my people would not have been killed and have died out, so that now there is but me, the Princess of the Wampanoags, to live out my life alone on the ground hallowed as the living place of my ancestors."


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Wootonekanuske (Charlotte Mitchell) 2 Nov 1848 - 2 May 1930
Thus spoke Princess Wootonekanuske, the squaw sachem, who, alone in Massachusetts has kept the faith of her forefathers, has refused to marry any but an Indian and has there held herself as the only Princess of the tribes that, but for the kindly feeling of Massasoit toward the Pilgrims, might have wiped out that band of adventurers, and left this land to its original owners, the Indian.

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Princess Wootonekanuske lives alone in Lakeville, near Middleboro, in a small house in the woods bordering Lake Assawampsett, where her ancestors used to hunt and fish.

Up to two years ago she had a sister [Tewelema] with her, she too a princess of the royal blood of Massasoit. She was an invalid for 12 years and passed away two years ago, leaving her 73-year old sister to carry on the heritage of their illustrious forefathers.

The home of this Indian Princess stands alone in the woods, half a mile through a little used cart path, which leads to a grassy clearing, open to the sun and the wind, such a place as the Indians of 300 years ago chose of their abidingplace.

The cottage is a frame structure situated on the grant of land which was made to Tuspaquin, who married Amie, daughter of Massasoit. The original grant amounted 600 acres, but is not but 15 acres, the house, built mainly by the hands of the princess and her sister, fairly large garden and some woodland.

There, alone, this princess of the ancient Indian tribe lives a secluded life, peddling her few vegetables about Middleboro and her succulent grape jams and jellies.

She is a very spry, bright old lady, her complexion of copper showing without further proof that she is a full-blooded Indian. She is simple in thought, not a bit cranky, sensible in her way of looking at things and devoted to her home, in which she has lived for 50 years, and the garden which until the state granted her a small pension, served to support her and her invalid sister.

The princess is known as Charlotte Mitchell, but she prefers her Indian name of Wootonekanuske. Her pride is that of an Indian and, when she was persuaded this summer to visit Plymouth, her meeting with President Harding was more like a princess of a royal court greeting a servitor.

“King Philip was a real man,” says the princess. “He did his best to stamp out the white man from these shores and I honor him for it. He was my uncle seven times removed and a real prince of royal blood. He as well as MAssasoit hunted and fished in these lands, just as I have done all my life until lately.”

Many people wonder how the Indians could travel such long distances with so many ‘carrys’ in the old days. The canoes were made of light frames and covered with skins. When a portage was necessary the covering was removed and, while one Indian carried the frame of the canoe, the other could easily carry the skin covering.”

“I am the only titled descendant of Massasoit; I have never married. When a woman of our tribe marries other than an Indian she loses caste and no longer belongs to the tribe.”

“I used to raise a lot of flowers here, but of late I find myself too old to do more than raise a few vegetables and sell them occasionally. When we first came to live on this old grant of land we built a tent, but gradually we have erected this house and I guess it will last me until the call of the Great Father comes.”

“We had pigs and cows and quite a farm and served bacon and ham which we smoked ourselves, but now I am alone and not very strong, so I just work as much as I can and wait.”

“I live here with only my dog for company. He is part St. Bernard and part Collie. Teddy is a good watch dog, although no one has ever troubled me here. I have some Indian mortars and pestles and a few arrow heads that we found on this ground.”

“I took part in the parade at Plymouth and also the unveiling of the monument to Massasoit, only because some of my loyal friends persuaded me to. Why should I celebrate the landing of the men who wiped out my people?”

“I do not know of a person with Pilgrim blood in his veins who has respect for an Indian. The people who have come from countries other than England respect us and treat us right, the the original Mayflower blood still cries for our extinction.”

“Why, my ancestor, my seven times removed uncle, King Philip, a son of Massasoit, was drawn and quartered by these very people at Mt. Hope, in what is now Rhode Island, and up to not over 50 years ago his hand was preserved in Pilgrim hall in Plymouth, for the palefaces to gloat over.”

“Massasoit made a great mistake when he signed a treaty with the white men. He signed the doom of his people right there and, although King Philip tried to right our wrongs, by that time the white men were too strong for us and, as a result, I am the only full caste representative of our tribe still alive.”

“The way Germany went through Belgium was nothing compared to what the Pilgrims did to the Indians
Simply trying to get through ––the Pilgrims were attempting to stamp out all of Indian blood so they could have our lands for their own.”

“An Indian is always loyal to a friend and so, when Mrs. Holmes, of Middleboro, vice regent of the D. A. R., pleaded with me to go to Plymouth, I went. They rode me up the street in a monkey cart and then left me. I met a friend who took me to see the president, but I didn’t feel right toward the white men and was glad to get home again.”

“I told the president I came to meet him, and not to celebrate the wiping out of the Indians by the white men. Why the Pilgrims burned the squaws, the old men and the papooses right in the wigwams. Why should I celebrate such doings?”

There was a time when numerous descendants of Massasoit considered theirs the land stretching as far as the eye could reach from the little cottage on Lake Assawampsett. And before that, in the old days of the old chief himself, a day’s travel would not carry one off the land he considered his dominion. Gradually the demands of the white men have cut down the original grant to the small patch on which the princess holds her court.

You remember from history the story of the first terrible winter spent by the Pilgrims at Plymouth, how their crops failed and starvation threatened them. Just when things looked the blackest and there was slight hope of survival, the Indians, headed by Massasoit, came marching out of the forest. Some of the braves carried haunches of venison, others bore skins filled with Indian corn, and this food was given, without charge to the settlers.

Then the council house of the tribe was pitched right where Princess Wootonekanuske’s cottage is now and far and wide came chiefs of the tribes for conference. Then the lodges of the braves were many, now the sole remnant of the tribe is represented by this tiny, little old lady who lives alone on the hunting grounds of her forefathers.

“About my ancestors?” said the princess, when questioned. “Many people have the idea that I am descended from King Philips, but I am not, except he was my uncle seven generations removed. I trace my blood to Massasoit through my mother, who came in direct line from Amie, the daughter of Massasoit, and the sister of King Philip.
“My mother’s name was Zervia Gould before her marriage. Her father traced his lineage to Massasoit and her mother to the Black Sachem, brother-in-law to King Philip.”

“My father was Thomas Mitchell, a full-blooded Cherokee Indian, who for many years followed the seas sailing out of Boston in the Chinese trade. He died in Fall River in 1859.”

“I am proud of my ancestry and have striven to live up to the best of the Indian’s standards, the standards which caused Governor Winslow to write 300 years ago that he had found the tribe of Massasoit faithful in their covenants and absolutely honest to their dealings.”

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KING P WAR
Brief Narrative of the Origin and the Progress of the War with the IndiansNo 1. Plymouth Commissioners presented this following narrative, shewing the manner of the beginning of the present war with the Indians of Mount Hope and Pocasset.
 
A brief narrative of the beginning and progress of the present trouble between us and the Indians, taking its rise in the Colony of New Plymouth in the year of 1675
 
Not to look back further than the troubles that were between the Colony of New Plymouth and Philip Sachem of Mount Hope in the year 1671.  It may be remembered that the settlement and issue of that controversy was obtained and made (principally) by the mediation and interposed advice of counsel of the other two confederate colonies,[1] who upon a careful inquiry and search into the grounds of that trouble, found that the said Sachem’s pretenses of wrongs and injuries from that Colony were groundless and false, and that he (although first in arms) was the peccant and offending party, and that Plymouth had just cause to take up arms against him.  And it was then agreed that he should pay that Colony a certain sum of money in part of their damage and charge by him occasioned, and he then not only renewed his ancient covenant of friendship with them but made himself and his people absolute subjects to or Sovereign Lord King Charles the Second and to that his Colony of New Plymouth.[2]
 
Since which time we know not that the English of that or any other Colony have been injurious to him or his, that might justly provoke them to take up arms against, but sometime the last winter, the Governor of Plymouth[3] was informed by Sassamon, a faithful Indian, that the said Philip was undoubtedly endeavoring to raise new troubles and was endeavoring to engage all the sachems round about in a war against us, some of the English also that lived near the said sachem communicated their fears and jealousies concurrent with what the Indian had informed, about a week after John Sassamon had given his information, he was barbarously murdered by some Indians,[4] for his faithfulness (as we have cause to believe) to the interest of God and of the English.  Sometime after Sassamon's death, Philip having heard that the Governor of Plymouth had received some information against him and purported to send to him to appear at their next court that they might inquire into those reports, came down of his own accord to Plymouth a little before their court in the beginning of March last, at which time the Council of that Colony upon a large debate had with him, had great reason to believe that the information against him might be in substance true, but not having full proof thereof, and hoping that the very discovery of it so far, would cause him to desist, they dismissed him friendly, giving him only to understand that if they heard further concerning that matter, they might see reason to demand his arms to be delivered up for their security (which was, according to former agreement between him and them) and he engaged that on their demand they should be surrendered unto them or their order.  At that court, we had many Indians in examination concerning the murder of John Sassamon but had not then testimony in the case, but not long after an Indian appearing to testify, we apprehended three by him charged to be the murderers and secured them to a trial at or next court holden in June, at which time and a little before the court, Philip began to keep his men in arms about him and to gather strangers to him and to march about in arms towards the upper end of the neck on which he lived and near to the English houses, who begun thereby to be something disquieted, but took as yet no further notice, but only to set a military watch in the next towns of Swansea and Rehoboth.   Some hints we had that Indians were in arms whilst our court was sitting,[5] but we hoped it might arise from a guilty feared in Philip, that we would send for him and bring him to trial with the other murderers, and that if he saw the court broke up and he not sent for the cloud might blow over and indeed or innocence made us very secure and confident it would not have broke out into a war, but no sooner was our court dissolved,[6] but we had intelligence from Lieutenant John Brown of Swansea that Philip and his men continued constantly in arms, many strange Indians from several places flocked in to him, that they sent away their wives to Narraganset, and were giving or people frequent alarms by drum and guns in the night and had guarded three passages towards Plymouth and that their young Indians were earnest for a war.  On the seventh of June, Mr. Benjamin Church being on Rhode Island, Weetamoo and some of her chief men told him that Philip intended a war speedily with the English.  Some of them saying that they would help him, and that he had already given them leave to kill Englishmen’s cattle and rob their houses.  About the 14th and 15th June, Mr. James Brown[7] went twice to Philip to persuade him to be quiet, but at both times found his men in arms and Philip very high and not persuadable to peace.  On the 14th June, our Council writ an amicable friendly letter to Philip, shewing our dislike of his practices and advising him to dismiss the strange Indians and command his own men to fall quietly to their business that our people might also be quiet, and not to suffer himself to be abused by reports concerning us who intended no hurt towards him, but Mr. Brown could not obtain any answer from him. On the 17th June, Mr. Paine of Rehoboth and several English going unarmed to Mount Hope to seek their horses at Philips request, the Indians came and presented their guns at them and carried it very insolently though no way provoked by them. On the 18th or 19th, Job Winslow his house at Swansea was broke open and rifled by Philip's men. June the 20th, being the Sabbath day, the people of Swansea were alarmed by the Indians, two of our inhabitants burned out of their houses and their houses rifled, and that the Indians were marching up (as they judged) to assault the town and, therefore, entreated speedy help from us.  We, thereupon the 21th of June, sent up some force to relieve that town and dispatched more with speed. On Wednesday 23 June, a dozen more of their houses at Swansea rifled. On the 24th, Layton was slain at the fall river.  On the 25th June, divers of our people at Swansea slain and many houses burned; until which time and for several days after, though we had a considerable force there, both of our own and of the Massachusetts (to our grief and shame) they took no revenge of the enemy. Thus slow were we and unwilling to engage ourselves and neighbours in a war, having many insolencies almost intolerable from them, at whose hands we had deserved better.
 
Josiah Winslow
Thomas Hinckley
 
Certification:The substance of what is here declared doth clearly and more particularly appear in the record and letters related unto of the several dates abovementioned. 
Endorsement:Orders for Raising Soldiers
Cataloguing:1a, 1b, 1c
 
 
[1] Commissioners from Plymouth and Massachusetts Colonies interrogated Philip at Taunton, Massachusetts on April 10, 1671.  Charged with preparing for war, the sachem said the actions of his Wampanoag were defensive against the aggressions of the Narragansett. Under a treaty negotiated at Taunton, Philip finally agreed to plege his friendship to the English, pay an annual tribute, and surrender his followers' firearms .  Ellis, King Philip's War, 40-41.
[2] Philip bristled at the thought of being under the jurisdiction of colonial authorities, seeing them in a lesser capacity.  On the other hand, he saw Charles as an equal and called him his brother.  For more discussion, see Pulsipher, Subjects Unto the Same King, 97-100.
[3] Josiah Winslow of Plymouth Colony
[4] Three Indians were charged:  Tobias and his son, Wampapaqun, and Mattashunnamo, Philip's counselor.   Brooks, Our Beloved Kin, 63, 115-117.
[5] The trial was before a Court of Election at Plymouth, which opened on June 1, 1675.  Presiding were Governor Josiah Winslow, John Alden, William Bradford, Thomas Hinkley, John Freeman, Constant Southworth, James Browne, and James Cudworth. Shurtleff, Records of the Colony of New Plymouth, Court Orders, Vol. V. 1668-1678, 163, 167.
[6] At that court, the three accused , Tobias and his son, Wampapaqun, and Mattashunnamo, were tried by a jury of English colonists and Indians and found guilty.  Tobias and Mattashunnamo were hanged.  By confessing, Wampapaqun escaped immediate execution but was shot a month later.  Brooks, Our Beloved Kin, 115-117, 127.
[7] James Brown was the uncle of the previously mentioned John Brown.

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Tribes
Philip's Indians
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​The Retaliation
The very next day, June 24, 1675, an armed Wampanoag war party targeted the Salisbury family in a fierce retaliatory strike. Both John Salisbury and his father William were killed and scalped outside their home. His mother, Susanna, heard the gunshots from a distance and was attacked but ultimately survived the raid. 
John Salisbury was buried locally, having never married or had children, leaving behind a legacy tied permanently to the devastating outbreak of King Philip's War. 

​Attack on Swansea (1675)June 20–24, 1675
The Attack on Swansea was a series of raids carried out by Wampanoag warriors on the village of Swansea in Plymouth Colony in June 1675. These attacks started King Philip’s War.

The Attack on Swansea in June 1675 marked the beginning of King Philip’s War (1675–1678), a conflict between the New England Confederation and Native American Indian tribes united under King Philip of the Wampanoag. Initiated by Wampanoag warriors, the attacks resulted in looting, burning of buildings, and subsequent raids and ambushes carried out against English settlers. The death toll and escalating violence convinced colonial authorities that full-scale war was imminent, leading to the mobilization of militias by the colonies that were members of the New England Confederation.

The following facts about the Attack on Swansea in 1675 provide a comprehensive overview of the background and history of what is recognized as the first engagement of King Philip’s War. 
Location of Swansea

• Swansea was a significant English settlement in Plymouth Colony, which had been established by the Pilgrims in 1620, 55 years earlier.
• Swansea was located on the border between English settlements and Wampanoag tribal lands.
• The proximity of Swansea to Wampanoag territory made the settlers vulnerable to attacks.

King Philip’s Indian Confederacy

• Metacom, also known as King Philip, was the sachem — chief — of the Wampanoag Tribe.
• King Philip organized a confederacy of Native American Indian tribes, intending to carry out raids on English settlements.
• King Philip was upset over the way the Plymouth colonists treated the Wampanoag and their encroachment on Wampanoag lands.
• Historical accounts suggest King Philip had been making preparations for a conflict with New England settlers for some time before the Attack on Swansea.

The Attack on Swansea Started on June 20, 1675

• On June 20, 1675, Wampanoag warriors initiated the attack on Swansea by raiding farms on the outskirts of the village.
• The outlying farms were destroyed as the Wampanoags looted and set them on fire.
• The residents of Swansea sought refuge in the town’s garrison houses and sent for assistance from the neighboring settlements.
• Garrison houses were fortified homes that were intended to keep settlers safe during attacks.

Militia Arrived at Swansea on June 21

• Militia forces from nearby Bridgewater and Taunton responded to the Swansea Alarm.
• They arrived in Swansea on June 21, intending to provide support and defend the village against further attacks.
• However, by the time the reinforcements arrived, the Wampanoag warriors had already departed from the area.

The Wampanoag Returned on June 23

• According to some accounts, the Wampanoag returned on June 23 and carried out more raids.
• During these attacks, a Plymouth boy reportedly shot and killed one of the Wampanoag warriors.

Wampanoag Attacks on June 24

• The following day, June 24, Wampanoag parties launched ambushes on several groups of colonists who had ventured outside of their garrison houses.
• These coordinated attacks resulted in the deaths of nine English settlers and left two others mortally wounded.
• The attacks ended when Captain Benjamin Church arrived at the head of a small column of Massachusetts Militia.

The New England Confederation Responds

• The Attack on Swansea was a turning point for the governments of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay and their relations with the Wampanoag.
• Colonial officials interpreted these attacks as evidence the Wampanoag were intent on initiating a full-scale war against the English settlers.
• Colonial militias were mustered and prepared to engage the Wampanoag.
• At the time, Plymouth and Massachusetts were part of the New England Confederation, along with Connecticut and New Hampshire.

Why did the Wampanoag Attack Swansea?

• Despite King Philip’s grievances and preparations for war, historians believe it is unlikely he would have chosen to start the war with an attack on Swansea.
• Some have speculated that unhappy members of the Wampanoag Tribe may have launched the initial attack on Swansea without permission from King Philip.

Outcome of the Attack on Swansea

• The attack on Swansea sparked the war, catching both English settlers and King Philip by surprise.
• This attack escalated tensions and prompted the English colonies to perceive the Wampanoags as hostile, leading the New England Confederation to mobilize the military.

Attack on Swansea SignificanceThe Attack on Swanse is important to United States history for its role in King Philip’s War. It was the first engagement of the war and forced the New England Confederation to mobilize its forces to protect New England settlers. Ultimately, King Philip’s War was a destructive conflict that took a heavy toll on New England and the tribes that were part of King Philip’s confederacy.
Attack on Swansea APUSH ReviewUse the following links and videos to study the King Philip’s War, the New England Confederation, and Colonial America for the AP US History Exam. Also, be sure to look at our Guide to the AP US History Exam.
Attack on Swansea Definition APUSHThe Attack on Swansea was a significant event during King Philip’s War in June 1675. Native American warriors, allied with the Wampanoag leader King Philip, launched a surprise assault on the English settlement of Swansea in Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts. Swansea suffered considerable damage, and several colonists were killed or captured. The attack marked the beginning of widespread violence and conflict throughout New England, known as King Philip’s War.
Account of the Attack on SwanseaThe following is taken from King Philip’s War by George William Ellis and John Emery Morris and was published in 1906.
Events Leading to the Attack on SwanseaThe events leading up to the Attack on Swansea have been included here, to provide additional context about the incident and to help explain why the Wampanoags may have attacked Swansea. According to King Philip’s War, hostilities around Swansea started as early as June 18. 

• John Sassamon told Plymouth officials that King Philip was planning to attack English settlements.
• Sassamon died sometime during the winter of 1674–1675 and was found in the spring of 1675.
• Plymouth officials accused three Wamponag Indians of murdering him.
• The Wampanoags were found guilty of murder and sentenced to be hanged.
• Captain Benjamin Church learned King Philip was preparing an attack.
• Captain Church warned Plymouth officials, who, in turn, warned Massachusetts officials in Boston.
• Massachusetts sent commissioners to meet with the Narragansett Tribe, to make sure they did not join King Philip.

Please note that section headings, spacing, and grammatical errors have been corrected to help readers scan the information and understand it.

Captain Benjamin Church played a key role in King Philip’s War. Image Source: New York Public Library Digital Collections.John SassamonThe least suspicion of intrigue could not long escape the notice of those Indian converts who kept the authorities well-informed of all that went on. There had been living among the Wampanoags at Nemasket, the daughter of whose chief he had married, an Indian convert of Eliot’s, named Sassamon, a Natick, a “cunning and plausible man,” Hubbard calls him.
This man has accompanied Philip to Boston as an interpreter after the death of Alexander and served him for some time thereafter, but having, it is said, to have been found guilty of some offense, had returned to Natick and again professed Christianity.
Associated with Philip on familiar terms, he claimed to have received the sachem’s confidences and betrayed them to the settlers under pledge of secrecy; his life would be in danger, he declared, if his connection with the matter were made known. 
His information (because it had an Indian origin “and one can hardly believe them when they speak truth”) was not at first much regarded, but Philip, learning in advance of a summons, of the charges, made haste to Plymouth to free himself from suspicion, and, having given renewed assurances of his friendly intentions, was allowed to return.
John Sassamon’s Body FoundIn the spring of the following year, the dead body of Sassamon was discovered in Assowomset Pond. An Indian named David, having discovered some bruises on the body, suspicions were aroused and an investigation led to the belief that Sassamon had been killed while fishing during the winter and his body thrown under the ice.
Indians Accused of Killing John SassamonThree Indians, Tobias, Mattaschunanamoo, and Wampapaquin, Tobias’ son, were arrested on the evidence of an Indian who claimed to have been an eyewitness of the affair.
The Indians claimed that Sassamon had been drowned while fishing and that the marks on his body were caused by contact with the ice. They declared that the informer who claimed to have been an eyewitness, “had gambled away his coat and, on its being returned and payment demanded, he had, in order to escape the debt, accused them of the murder knowing it would please the English and cause them to think him the better Christian.”
Mather, ever on the watch for the marvelous, declared that the body bled afresh when Tobias approached, a sign then and to a much later day credited as a proof of guilt. 
The three Wampanoags were convicted by a white jury to which had been added several friendly Indians, and executed, “and though they were all successfully turned off the ladder at the gallows utterly denying the fact, yet the last of them, hoping to break or slip the rope, did before his going off the ladder again confess that the other Indians did really murder John Sassamon, and that be himself, though no actor in it, was yet a looker-on.”
Wampapaquin was reprieved but shot within the month. No direct proof was produced at the trial to connect Philip with Sassamon’s death, but it was widely believed that it had been decreed, according to Indian law, by Philip and his council, as a punishment for his treachery.
James Brown of Swansea Warns PhilipThe authorities held back from all aggressive action, in the belief that such a course would allow the excitement among the warriors time to abate, but as Philip made no attempt to clear himself, James Brown of Swansea, who had been on friendly terms with him, solicited and obtained permission to inform Philip that the Plymouth authorities disclaimed all injurious intentions and urged him to discontinue hostile preparations.
Rhode Island Leaders Meet with King PhilipRhode Island, alarmed at the state of affairs, made ineffectual attempts to compromise the matter and bring Philip to an agreement. 
Deputy Governor Easton of that colony, and five others, including Samuel Gorton, met Philip and his chiefs at Bristol Neck Point on the 17th of June and proposed that the quarrel and all matters in contention should be arbitrated. 
Wampanoag Grievances and English AssurancesIt might be well, was the reply, but that all the English agreed against them. Many square miles of land were taken from them by English arbitrators. They then went on to recite their grievances. 
If they surrendered their arms jealousy might be removed, but the Englishmen would not deliver them again as promised until they had paid a fine. 
They said they had been the first to do good, the English the first to do wrong. 
When the English first came the king’s father was as a great man and the English as a little child.
He constrained other Indians from raiding the English, gave them seed, showed them how to plant and was free to do them good, and let them have one hundred times more land then than now the king had for his own people, but the king’s brother, when he was king, came miserably to die, being forced to court, and, as they judged, poisoned. 
Another grievance: that if twenty of them testify that the English had done them wrong, it was nothing, but if ever one of their worst Indians testified against any Indian or the king, when it pleased the English it was sufficient. 
Englishmen made Indians drunk and cheated them in bargains. 
English cattle and horses increased. The Indians could not keep their corn from being spoiled, they never being used to fences. The English were so eager to sell Indians liquor that most of the Indians spent much in drunkenness and then raided upon the sober Indians, and they did believe often hurt the English cattle, and their king was obliged to sell more land to pay the fines.
The white delegates endeavored to persuade them to lay down their arms and not to make war, for the English were too strong for them. 
They said the English should do to them as they did when they were strong to the English.
The conference broke up without any agreement having been reached. Easton states as his belief that the Indians would have accepted the Governor of New York and an Indian king as arbitrators and that peace might still have been preserved. It is more than doubtful. That the Wampanoags had broken loose from all restraint seems certain. Philip would at any rate have been glad to gain time in order to have procured arms and ammunition and to involve more definitely the other tribes, but in the state of mind of his followers no such course was possible; the pent-up passions of many years, fanned into flame, were past suppression.
Benjamin Church Meets with AwashonksCaptain Benjamin Church of Little Compton, in the territory of the Saconet Indians, attending by invitation of the squaw sachem, Awashonks, a ceremonious dance, June 15th, found on his arrival that it had been given in honor of six ambassadors from Philip, her overlord, to make sure of her co-operation. 
On her explanation of Philip’s overtures, he boldly advised her in their presence to knock them on the head and seek refuge with the English. 
Peter Nunnuit Informs Church that Philip is Preparing for WarTwo days later, near Pocasset, he met Peter Nunnuit, who had married Alexander’s widow, Weetamoo. Peter said he had just come from Mount Hope where Philip had been holding a dance in which Indians from all the Wampanoag tribes had participated; that war was certain, and that Philip had been forced to promise the young men “that on the next Lord’s day when the English were gone to meeting, they should level their house and from that time forward kill their cattle.” 
He also told them that Samuel Gorton and James Brown of Swansea were at that time at Mount Hope, and that one of the young warriors wanted to kill Brown, but that Philip prevented it saying that his father had charged him to show kindness to Mr. Brown. 
Church, at the request of Peter, had an interview with Weetamoo, who was nearby and advised her to go over to Rhode Island for security and to send a messenger to the governor immediately. He then hastened with the information he had acquired to Plymouth.

1906 photograph of the location of King Philip’s Campsite at Mount Hope. Image Source: King Philip’s War by George W. Ellis and John E. Morris., 1906.Massachusetts Commissioners Meet with the Narragansett TribeOn the afternoon of June 21st, Governor Leverett of Massachusetts received a letter from Governor Winslow informing him of the situation. 
It was determined, in view of the attitude of the Wampanoags, to immediately send a commission consisting of Captain Edward Hutchinson, Seth Perry, and William Powers, to the Narragansetts to find out their intentions and to put them on their good behavior. 
Acting upon their instructions they stopped at Providence and induced Roger Williams to accompany them to the chief village of the Narragansetts.
At this conference Pessacus, Canonchet, and Ninigret seem to have assented to the desires of the Massachusetts authorities and promised to be neutral. 
The commissioners departed apparently satisfied with the success of their mission, but Williams, who knew the Indian character well, seems to have been suspicious and, on June 27th, wrote to Winthrop that he believed their friendly answers were empty “words of falsehood and treachery.” 
Pessacus, one of the sachems of the Narragansetts, is said to have confessed to several of the men of Newport, that while his heart sorrowed he could not rule the youth or common people or persuade the chiefs. 
Even before the Massachusetts Commission had started on its journey two houses had been burned by the Wampanoags at Mattapoiset, on June 19th.
Philip Prepares for War and Desires an Alliance with the NipmucksPhilip, driven to bay and forced into conflict by the passions he now found himself unable to control, could hardly have plunged into the conflict confident of success. He knew the bitter resentment and the desire of his warriors for war. 
The independent tribes of the Nipmucks were ripe for revolt. Initial successes on his part were all that was needed to bring them to his aid, but he knew equally well that sympathy, the sense of common wrongs, and a tentative understanding, were but feeble reeds on which to lean if disaster threatened.
Events had rushed forward faster than his plans or preparations. 
No general conspiracy had been organized; no concerted action arranged for, and as the old Wampanoag Confederacy had fallen into ruins under the pressure of the whites, he could depend with certainty only on his personal following. 
Advantages of the IndiansThe Indians, however, did not lack advantages and if once the pent-up fury of the different tribes should be loosed upon the long frontier the contest was certain to be long continued. 
They had become expert in the use of firearms. 
They knew the fording places of the rivers and every trail and were acquainted with the daily habits of the settlers. 
They were adept in a method of warfare admirably suited to the character of the country. 
To turn every cover and position to advantage, to strike quickly, to lie patiently in ambuscades, and to draw off rapidly on the failure of an attack with a fleetness in which the heavily armed settler, unaccustomed to forest warfare, could not compete, were formidable tactics in a broken and wooded country of long distances sparsely settled and traversed only by rough trails.
Attitude of the English Settlers Toward the IndiansThe martial spirit which had distinguished the early generation of colonists had ceased to inspire the new generation. 
The very spreading out of the settlements offered a wide-flung and weakly settled frontier to the swift-moving warriors, while the contempt that had grown up among the settlers with respect to the Indians, both from the result of the Pequot War and the long subservience of the race in later dealings, made it certain that for a time at least, over-confidence and lack of military training would lead to catastrophes.
Veteran Soldiers and Defenses of the SettlersThere were among the settlers, however, many traders well acquainted with Indian ways, and if the great mass of the settlers were untrained to warfare, yet there were those among them who had served as under-officers and captains under Cromwell, in the most perfect army the century had seen. 
Material for good soldiers was in abundance, arms, and equipment plentiful, their stockaded towns offered protection and a base of supplies that the Indian villages could not possibly afford. 
Many individual Indians were certain to join them and the whole of the Mohegans would be their effective allies, while the numbers, resources, and character of the population once brought into the field and trained, made the result of a prolonged campaign certain.
The Number of Indians Engaged in King Philip’s WarTradition had attributed to the Indians engaged in the war, between seven and eight thousand fighting men. The swift movements of the war parties, some of whom were able to cover forty miles a day, made their forces appear far greater than was actually the case, and neither the fears of the settlers nor the reports of friendly Indians desirous of enhancing the value of their services were likely to underestimate the number. 
Their actual number probably did not at most exceed thirty-five hundred. Of these the Wampanoags and their kindred mustered about five hundred; the Nipmucks and the Connecticut River tribes not over eleven hundred; the Abenakis and Tarratines about six hundred; the Narragansetts about one thousand. In addition, there were probably some three hundred scattered warriors, roving Indians, small parties from the northern tribes, and Christian Indians, throwing in their lot with their kindred either from choice or, as occurred in more than one instance, driven into revolt by the harsh treatment of the suspicious settlers.
A Wampanoag is Killed at SwanseaThe Wampanoags, in the belief it is said, that the first party to shed blood would be vanquished, had been provoking the settlers by daily outrages to commence hostilities, and on the 18th of June one of a number of Indians was shot and wounded by an irate settler at Swansea.’ 
According to John Easton some Indians at Swansea were seen by an old man and a lad, pilfering from houses whose owners were at church, whereupon the old man bade the young one shoot, and one of the Indians fell but got away. 
Later in the day some of the neighboring Indians came to one of the garrison houses, either Miles’s or Bourne’s, and asked why they had shot the Indian. 
In reply to the English question whether he was dead, the Indian said, “yea,” on which one of the English remarked that “it was no matter.” The other endeavored to convince the Indians that it was but a young man’s idle words, but the Indians, returning no answer, went hastily away.
Benjamin Church Plans for an AttackPlymouth Colony had already taken precautions in view of the existing conditions. Captain Benjamin Church, at the request of Winslow, had some time before induced the Governor of Rhode Island to provide boats for the patrol of the northern shore in case of an outbreak, and the towns had been warned to be on their guard and prepared to send their contingents into the field at a moment’s notice.
The Attack on Swansea BeginsNow, on the 20th of June, a messenger brought news to Plymouth that the house of Job Winslow at Swansea had been plundered by Indians on the 18th, and that on the 19th several houses, among them that of Hugh Cole, had been burned while the people were attending worship.
Benjamin Church Gathers the MilitiaCaptain Church was immediately ordered to collect a force of twenty horsemen at Bridgewater and to proceed to Swansea by way of Taunton, which was appointed as the rendezvous of the Plymouth forces.
The troops were already assembling under Majors James Cudworth and William Bradford and Captains Gorham and Fuller when Church marched into the place on the 21st, and the next day the whole force proceeded toward Swansea, Church leading the van with his horsemen and a number of friendly Indians, “and to keep so far before as not to be in sight of the army, and so they did for by the way they killed a deer, flayed, roasted, and eat the most of him before the army came up with them.”
Panic in Plymouth ColonyPanic already reigned among the scattered farmhouses that stretched along the eastern shore, and Major Bradford, with the company from Bridgewater, leaving Swansea on the 23d, marched down to Jared Bourne’s stone house at Mattapoiset where nearly seventy people had collected. 
Everywhere along the march were to be met people flying from their homes, wringing their hands and bewailing their losses. 
Attack on WanamoisetA part of the relieving force was dispatched the next day to escort Mr. John Brown, who had acted as guide, to his home at Wanamoiset, with orders to act strictly on the defensive. 
Meeting, on their return, a party from the garrison going out with carts to bring in corn from the deserted and outlying houses, they warned them that the Indians were out in force and urged them not to proceed. 
Confiding in their numbers, however, the foragers continued on their way only to fall into an ambuscade, where, attacked and routed, they were driven back to the garrison with a loss of six killed.
The settlement was abandoned the following week, with the inhabitants seeking refuge on the island of Rhode Island.
Another Attack on SwanseaJune 24th was the day appointed by the authorities for humiliation and prayer, and as the settlers of Swansea were returning from service they were fired upon.
One was killed and several wounded. 
Two of the settlers were dispatched for assistance, to Plymouth. They were never to reach it, for the commissioners, Major Savage and Captain Thomas Brattle, who had been sent by Governor Leverett and the council to treat with Philip, on approaching Swansea in the evening, came upon their bodies weltering in blood upon the highway, and turned back to Boston.
Philip Protects Some SettlersPhilip, realizing, it is said, that the first blow, if the warriors took matters into their own hands, would be struck at Swansea and the neighboring towns, ordered no harm should be done to James Brown, Captain Thomas Willet, and James Leonard. 
He also sent word to Hugh Cole, who had befriended him to remove lest it should be out of his power to prevent harm befalling him, and extended protection to two small children because “their father sometime showed me kindness.”
Plymouth and Boston Respond to the Attack on SwanseaThe news of the attack reached Plymouth before night and messengers were immediately dispatched to Boston for assistance. Both governments took prompt measures. 
Boston Troops Prepare to March to SwanseaAt Boston, the drums were beaten to assemble the companies and in the late afternoon of the 26th, Captain Daniel Henchman with a company of foot, and Captain Thomas Prentice with a troop of horse, set forth. 
The infantry were armed with muskets and long knives fitted with handles to fix in the muzzles, and carried a knapsack, six feet of fuse, a pound of powder, a bandoleer passing under the left arm and containing a dozen or more cylinders holding a measured charge of powder, a bag containing three pounds of bullets and a horn of priming powder. The troopers were equipped with a sword and either two pistols or a carbine. All carried in addition a few articles of wearing apparel, a day’s provisions, and a pound of tobacco.
An Eclipse Darkens the SkyProlonging their march well into the evening they were nearing the town of Dedham on the Neponset River, twenty miles from Boston, when the moon was darkened by an eclipse (in Capricorn) “which caused them to halt for a little repose until the moon recovered her light.”
Some among them imagined they discerned in the moon a black spot resembling the scalp of an Indian, others made out the form of an Indian bow, ominous signs, “but both,” writes the chronicler, “might rather have thought of what Marcus Crassus, the Roman general going forth with an army against the Parthians, once wisely replied to a private soldier that would have dissuaded him from marching because of an eclipse of the moon in Capricorn, ‘that he was more afraid of Saggitarius (the archer) than of Capricornus,’ meaning the arrows of the Parthians.”
Samuel Mosely Brings Reinforcements“When the moon had again borrowed her light,” and the road once more became distinct, they resumed the march, reaching Attleboro, thirty miles from Boston, early in the morning. 
Here they rested until the afternoon when Captain Samuel Moseley, with a rough company of volunteers composed of sailors, privateersmen, and several paroled pirates accompanied by a number of hunting dogs, joined them.
The Boston Troops Arrive at SwanseaThe combined force of two hundred and fifty fighting men, besides the teamsters, pushing rapidly on, reached Swansea early in the evening of the 28th and pitched their camp alongside of Major Cudworth, and the Plymouth men near the fortified house of the Rev. Mr. Miles, a Baptist clergyman, which stood a short distance from the bridge leading toward Mount Hope.
Indians Attack the Militia at SwanseaImmediately on the arrival, a dozen of Prentice’s troopers, impatient of delay, under the command of Quartermaster Joseph Belcher and Corporal John Gill, with Captain Church as a volunteer, sallied over the bridge to explore the country beyond. 
Hardly had they cleared the bridge when a party of Indians in ambush poured in a volley upon them, killing William Hammond, a guide, wounding Gill and Belcher, and driving the rest back in confusion to the barricade that had been erected around the house of the Rev. Mr. Miles.
Made confident by this success, a number of Indians the next morning showed themselves at the end of the bridge, shouting derisively, while some, more bold than the rest, even ventured upon the bridge itself. 
The whole force was immediately drawn up and while the infantry advanced toward the bank of the stream, a troop of horse and a party of volunteers under Moseley rushed furiously down the road upon them and drove them off with loss, losing, however, one of their own number, Ensign Savage, wounded, it is said, by the fire from the infantry on the bank.
Thomas Savage Arrives at SwanseaOn the evening of the 29th which was spent skirmishing with the Indians, came Major Thomas Savage, accompanied by Captain Paige and sixty horse and as many foot, to take over the command of the Massachusetts forces.
New England Forces Begin the Search for King PhilipThe force assembled at Swansea now numbered over five hundred men, and, at noon on the following day, leaving a small guard in the garrison, the little army, with Major Cudworth in command, crossed over the bridge, and, throwing out horsemen on the flanks to prevent an ambuscade, pushed on toward Mount Hope.
Here and there, within the boundaries of the Indian country, they saw groups of empty wigwams and fields of corn, the smoking ruins of what had once been the homes of the settlers, and  “Bibles torn in pieces in defiance of our holy religion,” while ghastly heads and hands stuck upon stakes bore witness to the fate of the occupants. But, while Philip’s wigwam was discovered and the trail of his warriors followed to the shore, not an Indian was to be seen.
Throughout the day the rain had fallen steadily, soaking the troops to the skin, and as evening drew on the Plymouth men, passing over the strait, found shelter on the island of Rhode Island, but Major Savage, with the Massachusetts division, bivouacked in the open fields amid the storm.
Savage Returns to SwanseaWith the dawn came rumors that the Indians were in force near Swansea, and Savage, after laying waste the fields of growing corn, hastened back over the route of the day before, but though the force met many Indian dogs deserted by their masters, and saw at times burning dwellings, they came upon no Indians, and the infantry, tired and discouraged, made halt at Swansea.
Prentice Continues the SearchThe cavalry, however, under Prentice, proceeded to scour the country towards Seekonk and Rehoboth, but discovering no trace of the enemy finally encamped for the night.
The Militia Skirmish with Indians Near SwanseaThe next morning Prentice, having placed a portion of his command under Lieutenant Oakes with orders to march parallel with the main force along another road in order to cover a wider extent of territory, set out on his return to Swansea. 
They had advanced only a short distance when they came in sight of a party of Indians burning a house. 
Prentice was unable to reach them on account of several intervening fences, but Oakes, continuing along the road, charged upon and put them to flight, lulling several, among them Phoebe, one of their leaders, and losing one of his own men, John Druce.
King Philip at PocassetInformation in the meantime had reached Swansea that Philip had been discovered at Pocasset, but Savage, instead of marching directly toward this point with his whole force, divided his command, sending Henchman and Prentice to scour the woods and swamps along the mainland, while he, with the commands of Captains Paige and Moseley, marched down to Mount Hope. 
No signs of Indians were discovered at Mount Hope, and leaving a party to build a fort, despite the earnest entreaty of Church that the whole force should go over to Pocasset and drive Philip from cover, Savage again returned to Swansea.


On this day in 1675, Wampanoag warriors killed seven colonists in Swansea in retaliation for a series of injustices suffered at the hands of the English. This raid is generally considered the beginning of King Philip's War, a bloody conflict that would involve every New England colony and Algonquian peoples throughout the region. Over the next year, members of the Abenaki, Narragansett, Nipmuc, and Wampanoag tribes attacked more than half of all the settlements in New England and reduced about a dozen towns in Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay colonies to ashes. By August of 1676, more than 600 settlers had died and 1,200 homes had been burned. An estimated 3,000 Native Americans died at the hands of the English.
By the 1670s there were more than 50,000 English colonists living in New England, and they were steadily encroaching on land held by Native people.

In 1662 the governor of Plymouth Colony summoned Wamsutta, the young sachem, or chief, of the neighboring Wampanoag tribe, to meet with him. Distrustful of the Englishman's intentions, Wamsutta refused and was forcefully escorted to Plymouth by armed settlers. Days later, Wamsutta's men carried their leader home, dead. Inexplicably he had become ill shortly after his conference with colonial officials. Wamsutta's brother Metacom, called Philip by the English, succeeded him as sachem. Metacom firmly believed white settlers had poisoned Wamsutta; many Wampanoags agreed, further heightening tension.
By the 1670s there were more than 50,000 English colonists living in New England, and they were steadily encroaching on land held by Native people. Decimated by diseases Europeans brought to America in the early 1600s, the Algonquian population had fallen to about 20,000. The settlers and Native Americans were no closer to understanding each other and their respective cultures than at the beginning of the century. The Reverend Increase Mather captured English sentiments toward Philip and the Indians when he described the Wampanoag leader as one of the "heathen people amongst whom we live, and whose Land the Lord God of our Fathers hath given to us for a rightful Possession."
Time and again, ill-trained and poorly-prepared colonists found themselves thwarted by Native warriors . . .
In June 1675 simmering hostilities erupted into open warfare. Early in the month, following a highly questionable trial, Plymouth authorities hanged three Wampanoag men for the alleged murder of John Sassamon, a Native American who had been raised and educated among the Puritan elite. Metacom was enraged. On June 20th, Wampanoag warriors burned several farms in Swansea. Three days later, a Swansea man shot and mortally wounded a Wampanoag. The attack on the 24th was the Native warriors' revenge. Terrified Swansea settlers abandoned their farms and took refuge in garrisons.
Plymouth Colony sought help from Massachusetts Bay Colony and together their militias tried to corner Philip. He eluded them and fled to his Nipmuc allies in central Massachusetts. In the month that followed, Wampanoags attacked Taunton and Old Rehoboth; they burned much of Middleboro and destroyed the village of Dartmouth.
Time and again, ill-trained and poorly-prepared colonists found themselves thwarted by Native warriors who used guerilla-type tactics, were far more skillful marksmen, and could easily pick up and move their camps.
While the Native peoples' tactic of remaining constantly on the move prevented the English from counterattacking, it made it impossible for the them to grow and harvest food.
The Narragansett, feared and respected for the prowess of their warriors, had initially stayed out of the conflict, but in the late fall of 1675 rumors circulated among the English that the tribe was preparing for war. On December 19th the English staged a pre-emptive strike. A combined force of 1,000 men from Massachusetts Bay, Plymouth, and Connecticut colonies attacked a fortified Narragansett village. (Rhode Island, under Roger Williams's leadership, declined to participate.)
In what became known as the Great Swamp Fight, Englishmen slaughtered approximately 600 Narragansett men, women, and children. The English declared it a huge victory — a questionable conclusion since the Narragansett immediately joined the alliance of Native warriors and subsequently killed scores of settlers and destroyed hundreds of homes.
By the spring of 1676, the English had abandoned Springfield, Deerfield, Northfield, Brookfield, Lancaster, Groton, Mendon, Wrentham, Swansea, Rehoboth, and Dartmouth. Algonquian warriors staged raids in Chelmsford, Andover, Haverhill, Woburn, and as close to Boston as Braintree.
While the Native peoples' tactic of remaining constantly on the move prevented the English from counterattacking, it made it impossible for them to grow and harvest food. Algonquian food supplies began to run low, a fact their enemies were quick to notice.
. . . the English staged an offensive and forced the Indians to abandon their newly planted fields. In July colonists resumed their pursuit of King Philip.
In May 1676 the Nipmuc established camps along the Connecticut River, about five miles north of Deerfield, to fish and plant crops. Flush with recent victories, they let down their guard. The English had good intelligence and, when word reached them, 150 men staged a dawn attack. They killed primarily women, children, and old people as they slept. The Nipmuc warriors regrouped, fought back and then pursued the English, killing 39 of them. The Nipmuc's losses were estimated at 200.
The following month, the English staged an offensive and forced the Indians to abandon their newly planted fields. In July colonists resumed their pursuit of King Philip. They captured his wife and nine-year-old son and sold them into slavery. King Philip was betrayed by one of his own men, who shot and killed him on August 12, 1676. Englishmen decapitated and quartered his body. They placed his head on a stake and marched it through the streets of Plymouth, where it remained in public view for years.
Colonists systematically hunted down the other Native American leaders, killing some of them on sight and convincing others to surrender with promises of amnesty, then executing them. In September, Massachusetts Bay Colony declared that any Native person responsible for English deaths would be killed and all remaining Indians sold into slavery. Most of the enslaved were shipped to the West Indies, an almost certain death sentence.
By late 1676, English settlers had effectively cleared southern New England of its native inhabitants. A small number of King Philip's people — Metacom's Wampanoags — managed to survive. They sustained their culture in Mashpee on Cape Cod and on Martha's Vineyard.





Following the Colonists hanging of 3 Wampanoag men, the English settlement of Swansea was attacked in an area referred to by some historians as “Nockum Hill.” Igniting the long-standing tensions between the Wampanoag and Colonists into an all-out war. Known as Metacom’s (sometimes spelled Metacomet) or King Philip’s War, the conflict was named for the Wampanoag’s Chief Sachem, and may have begun without his permission. The war would last from 1675-1676 and is considered one of the deadliest per capita in American history. By the time the fighting subsided, a vast area from modern day Rhode Island to Maine had been devastated. Dozens of English settlements and Native towns had been burned, and enormous numbers of Wampanoags and their allies the Narragansett had been killed.
Using the financial support of a Preservation Planning Grant, the Town of Barrington will conduct a second archeological field survey of the historic Swansea settlement and try to determine the total scale of the fighting that took place on and around “Nockum Hill” in June of 1675. The town will primarily focus on the remnants of the English meetinghouse and other nearby settlement buildings to assess their role during the confrontation, while also exploring for evidence of pre-war interactions between the colonial and Indigenous inhabitants of the area.


​King Philip's War began in the border settlement of Swansea, Massachusetts, on June 20, 1675, when Wampanoag warriors raided isolated homesteads and burned houses. Full-scale conflict erupted on June 24 after retaliatory gunfire, leading to a devastating regional war.

Brief Chronology of King Philip's War
1675
JANUARY29 John Sassamon dies at Assawampsett Pond.
JUNE8 Sassamon's alleged murderers are executed at Plymouth.
11 Wampanoags are reported in arms near Swansea.
14-25 Rhode Island, Plymouth, and Massachusetts authorities attempt negotiation with Philip and seek guarantees of fidelity from Nipmucks and Narragansetts. 
History

24 Wampanoags begin attacking Swansea.
26 Massachusetts troops march to Swansea to join Plymouth troops.
26-29 Wampanoags attack Rehoboth and Taunton, elude colonial troops, and leave Mount Hope for Pocasset.
Mohegans travel to Boston and offer to fight on the English side.
JULY8-9 Wampanoags attack Middleborough and Dartmouth.
14 Nipmucks attack Mendon.
15 Narragansetts sign a peace treaty with Connecticut .
16-24 Massachusetts envoy attempts to negotiate with the Nipmucks.
19 Philip and his troops escape an English siege and flee Pocasset for Nipmuck territory. 
History


Attack on Brookfield
AUGUST2-4 Nipmucks attack Massachusetts troops and besiege Brookfield.
13 Massachusetts Council orders Christian Indians confined to praying towns.
22 A group of unidentified Indians kill seven colonists at Lancaster.
30 Captain Samuel Moseley arrests fifteen Hassanemesit Indians near Marlborough for the Lancaster assault and marches them to Boston.
SEPTEMBER1-2 Wampanoags and Nipmucks attack Deerfield. Massachusetts forces led by Moseley attack the town of Pennacook.
12 Colonists abandon Deerfield, Squakeag, and Brookfield.
18 Narragansetts sign a treaty with the English in Boston. Massachusetts troops are ambushed near Northampton. 
History

OCTOBER5 Pocumtucks attack and destroy Springfield.
13 Massachusetts Council orders Christian Indians removed to Deer Island.
19 English repel Indians from Hatfield.
NOVEMBERc. 1 Nipmucks take captive Christian Indians at Magunkaquog, Chabanakongkomun, and Hassanemesit, including James Printer.
2-12 Commissioners of the United Colonies order a united army to attack the Narragansetts.
DECEMBER7 Massachusetts Council prints a broadside explaining the case against the Narragansetts.
United colonial forces attack Narragansetts at the Great Swamp.
1676JANUARYPhilip travels westward to Mohawk territory, seeking, but failing to secure, an alliance. 
History

14 Joshua Gift is captured by the English.
27 Narragansetts attack Pawtuxet.
FEBRUARY10 Nipmucks attack Lancaster; Mary Rowlandson is taken captive.
14 Philip and Wampanoags attack Northampton. Massachusetts Council debates erecting a wall around Boston.
21 Nipmucks attack Medfield.
23 Massachusetts General Court debates the fate of Christian Indians. Indians assault sites within ten miles of Boston.
MARCH13 Nipmucks attack Groton.
26 Longmeadow, Marlborough, and Simsbury are attacked.
27 Nipmucks attack English forces near Sudbury.
28 Indians attack Rehoboth.
29 Providence is destroyed.
APRIL21 Indians attack Sudbury.
MAY2-3 Mary Rowlandson is released and returns to Boston.
18 English forces attack sleeping Indians near Deerfield.
18 Indians attack Hatfield.
c-31 Christian Indians are moved from Deer Island to Cambridge.
JUNE12 Indians attack Hadley but are repelled by Connecticut soldiers.
19 Massachusetts issues a declaration of amnesty for Indians who surrender.
22 Captain Tom is executed in Boston.
JULY2 Major John Talcott and his troops begin sweeping Connecticut and Rhode Island, capturing large numbers of Algonquians who are transported out of the colonies as slaves throughout the Summer.
James Printer surrenders in Cambridge.
4 Captain Benjamin Church and his soldiers begin sweeping Plymouth for Wampanoags.
Indians attack Taunton but are repelled.
17 Nearly two hundred Nipmucks surrender in Boston.
AUGUST2 Benjamin Church captures Philip's wife and son. 
History

The colonial youth who fired that first shot was John Salisbury, the 20-year-old son of settler William Salisbury. [1]

The Event at the Salisbury Homestead
Historical records, including accounts from Rhode Island Deputy Governor John Easton, detail exactly how the confrontation unfolded: [1, 2]

• The Shooting: On June 23, 1675, John Salisbury and his father returned to their evacuated home in Swansea, Massachusetts, to discover several Pokanoket Wampanoag men removing belongings. Under his father's instruction, the young John Salisbury fired his weapon, mortally wounding one of the Native men. [1, 2]
• The Prophecy Fulfilled: This act played directly into a Wampanoag prophecy. Tribal shamans had warned that the Native forces would only succeed if the English shed blood first. Salisbury’s shot provided the definitive trigger the younger warriors were waiting for. [1]

The Retaliation
The very next day, June 24, 1675, an armed Wampanoag war party targeted the Salisbury family in a fierce retaliatory strike. Both John Salisbury and his father William were killed and scalped outside their home. His mother, Susanna, heard the gunshots from a distance and was attacked but ultimately survived the raid. [1, 2, 3]
John Salisbury was buried locally, having never married or had children, leaving behind a legacy tied permanently to the devastating outbreak of King Philip's War. [1, 2]
Are you tracing the Salisbury family genealogy, or looking for specific primary colonial court documents regarding the Swansea raids? [1, 2]



12 Alderman, an Indian soldier under Church, kills Philip.
The Indians were warrior societies. Despite the imbalance of arms since they lacked cannon, and depended upon the English or French for muskets and powder, they were effective against European  military formations. Colonial militia, which quickly adopted the Indian's style of combat, what we call guerrilla or insurgency warfare, were better able to deal with Indian tactics. Indian warfare often involved surprise raids on isolated settlements as a way of evening the odds. In King Philip's  war (1675-1676), the Indian attacks left: "In Narraganset not one House left standing. "At Warwick, but one. At Providence, not above three. "At Potuxit, none left. ... "Besides particular Farms and Plantations, a great Number not be reckoned up, wholly laid waste or very much damnified. "And as to Persons, it is generally thought that of the English there hath been lost, in all, ..., above Eight Hundred." This is followed by a claim that fearful atrocities were worked on the survivors, and the women raped.
Deerfield would recover only to suffer repeated attacks in the French Indian Wars.
Battle of DeerfieldThe following is an account of the attack from New England Outpost:  War and Society in Colonial Deerfield, Richard I. Melvoin (1989): 
Military

By 1704 the town has grown to 260 people. The size of the town suggests stability. Yet like its predecessors Deerfield lies alone and exposed on the frontier. There are still no English settlements west of Deerfield for fifty miles, until one reaches the Hudson River and New York. Nor are there English towns north of Deerfield at all. To the east, too, lie forty miles of wilderness.
The late summer of 1703 has been a time of great anxiety. Activities of late spring have once again brought forth these fears. In May, early in the conflict known as Queen Anne's War, New York governor Lord Cornbury sent word that French soldiers and allied Indians from Canada were heading for Deerfield and the Connecticut valley. As of September a stressful summer has passed peacefully. Then in October, a small Indian force strikes, capturing two Deerfield men. Tensions heighten; the town strengthens its fortifications; the Massachusetts General Court sends soldiers to help protect the town. As of December, though, all is quiet. The cold and snow of winter now promise further respite, for in 1704 wars are not fought in the depths of winter.
But now the quiet of the winter is about to be shattered. Two hours before dawn on the fateful leap- year morning of February 29, 1704, Deerfield's inhabitants lie asleep inside the town's palisade. Because the Indian threat remains, all the town's residents, including the twenty Massachusetts soldiers just arrived from Boston, sleep in the dozen houses inside the fort. The other thirty or so houses outside the palisade lie empty. A watchman is assigned to patrol the town through the night. In the pre-dawn hours, however, he proves unfaithful to his duty. That breach of faith soon proves fatal.
Two miles north of town, just across the Deerfield River, lies a military force of two hundred to three hundred French and Indians. These men have traveled close to three hundred miles to reach this spot. Now they are ready to attack. Silently they cross the river and traverse two miles of open farmland toward the sleeping town. They are able to move quietly, for deep snow dampens all sound. Winter aids them in another way as well. Heavy drifts have piled snow against the walls of the fort, drifts so high that the attackers can easily scale the walls. Without a night watch to contend with, the warriors quickly move inside. The signal comes -- a cry rings out -- and the attack begins. 
DefenseIndustry

Although the townspeople fight back bravely, the French and Indian force is too strong and their advantage too great. Even the reinforcements who charge up from Hadley and Hatfield cannot turn the tide. At battle's end, the survivors grimly assess the town's losses. Fifty-six English men, women, and children lie dead; another 109 have been captured. In all, three-fifths of the town's people are gone. Almost half the houses have been burned. Deerfield is not abandoned because the region's  military commander will not allow it. As it is, the town barely clings to life. Edward Allen, Sarah's father is named city clerk to replace the previous clerk, Thomas French, who was killed in the battle. It is years before survival is assured.
The following description about Brookfield is from the book, American Indian Wars, by John Tebbel & Keith Jennison.

Key Events at the Start

• June 20, 1675: Pokanoket/Wampanoag bands burned several abandoned or isolated homes in Swansea.

• June 23, 1675: A local colonial youth shot at a Native individual, killing or wounding him.

• June 24, 1675: A heavy retaliatory raid on Swansea killed nearly a dozen settlers, prompting a colonial military response. [1, 2, 3, 4]

• ​

On June 23, 1675, escalating tensions in Swansea, Massachusetts reached a boiling point during the King Philip's War raids. A local colonist youth shot at a Pokanoket man near his home. This direct violence set off an immediate and fatal retaliation the very next day. [1, 2, 3, 4]

• Background and Escalation
• Wampanoag Raids: Between June 20 and June 23, Wampanoag warriors led by young men (likely against Metacom/King Philip's initial wish) looted and burned abandoned or isolated homes in Swansea. [1, 2, 3]
• The June 23 Flashpoint: Amid the ongoing raids, a local settler boy spotted a Pokanoket individual and a militia-associated colonist (John Salisbury) fired his musket, wounding or killing a Native person. [1, 2, 3]
• The Retaliation: Enraged by the shooting, Wampanoag fighters ambushed Swansea the next day on June 24, killing nine English settlers and officially igniting total frontier warfare across Plymouth Colony. [1, 2, 3]

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Swans killigs
​sassomon killing - killing of the 3





The "Black Sachem" (Watuspaquin or Tuspaquin) Wampanoag leader based around the Assawompsett Pond 
He married daughter of Massasoit
King Philips War - sided with Metacomet 
Captured and executed September 1676
His descendants remained in the Lakeville area (notably around Betty's Neck) for generations. Many of his family members are interred in the Wampanoag Royal Cemetery located in Lakeville.

Chief Massasoit (w) possible Saunka
1
2
3 Aime
4
5
  Brothers : Quadequina,  Akkompoin


Benjamin I "Tispaquin" married Aime (d) Chief Massasoit
​
Wamsley & Lydia Tusaquin (her father is Benjamin II)  son of Benjamin I  
 Bristol Gould & Phebe Wamsley (D) Wamsley & Lydia
      Zeviah Gould (Mitchell) 1807-0000) Great x3 granddaughter of Massasoit (h) Thomas C. Mitchell (0000-1859) 11 children

Teweeleema (Melinda Mitchell) 11 Apr 1836-7 Oct 1919 
Woontonekanuske (Charlotte Mitchell) 

John Sassimon (Suasiman) 
John Sassamon, the well known Christian Indian, who became a preacher to the Indians, under John Eliot. Having warned the Puritans of King Philips designs upon them, he was soon after murdered by his countrymen for his treachery to their cause.


 tuspaquin in july of 1676 while off raiding english horse and cattle. capt. benjamin church took his people captive, including his wife and children near the sippican river in bourne.
church garrunteed his life if he and his men would surrender in plymouth. when he came in church was away to boston and the pilgram fathers promptly had tispaqiun drawn and quartered his head was mounted on a pike along with annawon and their king, metacom to be displayed for many years. three other pokanokets were actually acussed of sassamons murder,tobias , patuck and tobias' fther who's name escapes me


 Tispaquin was Philip’s (Metacomet’s) brother-in-law. John Sassimon (Suasiman) was married to Tispaquin’s daughter. This fact made John’s wife an heir to Philip. So, when John Sassimon (Harvard educated, an advisor to Philip) wrote an English will for Philip, he designated the inheritance of some land to his wife, and so to himself. Now, Philip could not read English, and the fact of this planned inheritance was not shared by John when he had finished preparing the document...one that was revealed somehow to Philip afterwards, and which became one of the points made by the lone witness, Patuckson, at the murder trial of the three that killed John and threw his body under the January ice at Assawompset Pond. Those three were Tobias, Wampapaquan (Tobias’s son), and Mattashunnamo. All three were executed in Plymouth. Wampapaquan, being the youngest, was the last man hanged...but then his rope broke, which the superstitious interpreted to a sign of innocence, and he popped up confessing he didn’t do the murder, but the other two had done the act entirely on their own. How convenient. No matter. Justice would not be stopped. Wampapaquan was summarily executed a week later—taking no more chances with the rope; he was shot. All this took place in June 1675, just days before the first shots were fired in “King Philip’s War.”

ALEANDER On his departure, we wasn’t feeling well, so he stopped in to see Governor Winslow in Marshfield for some medical attention. Apparently whatever he was given did not help. Before Wamsutta got more than “halfway home” he fell over and died. Philip suspected his brother was poisoned. Some modern historians believe Wamsutta died of appendicitis.

In any case, Tispaquin continued to be an actor in the war, as late as the summer of 1676, more than a year after John Sassamon’s murder trial and the executions.

Pam said...Here is what, ostensibly happened to Tispaquin's wife, granddaughter of Massasoit, and daughter of Metacom (King Philip): she married John Starkweather and avoided the fate of her mother and brother who were sent to the Bahamas? Caribbean? I am her descendant. Her Christian name was Ann Philip, and sometimes Ann Philip Woodbury. My 8th ggrandmother.

​
Wyman v. Mitchell Oct 15, 1904

Thеse cases are petitions for the registration of title to certain tracts of land lying within the limits of Betty’s Neck, a point lying between Assawampsett and Pocksha Ponds in Lakeville, which, at a meeting of the Proprietors of Assa-wampsett Neck, May 11, 1697, was layed out,, as a part of lands then rightly belonging to the Indians, to one Betty Sausaman, under whom the respondents claim title by devise and descent.

The respondent, Melinda Mitchell, a woman of intelligence and education and a well known authority on matters of Indian history and tradition in this locality, appears officially in this case in full Indian costume, with paint, feathers and wampum, as the Princess Teweelema, and claims the land in her Indian right as being the last remaining property of the aborigines, land which has never come under the- private dominion of the white man. The claim is a somewhat startling one, but is presented in good faith and with the assistance of learned and able counsel. The respondents trace, and it is admitted prove, their descent from Wattuspaquin, otherwise known as the Old Black Sachem, a sister of King Philip. Wattuspaquin and her son conveyed this property to the Indian Assowetough, known to the English by the name of Betty, by a deed whiсh ran to the said Betty “ forever and especially her eldest daughter.” Betty later hy her will devised this property to her eldest daughter and her heirs forever, and of the said eldest daughter the present respondents are the only living heirs. Betty’s grand-danghter and her descendants have ever since lived on a pоrtion of the land where there still stands a house occupied hy these respondents.

Betty’s great-grandson, one Paul Squin, had a house on a part of the Wyman tract, together with a garden and an orchard of wild apple trees, some of which were planted hy the said Paul; and Paul’s sister, who was the grandmother of the present respondents, lived on the lot now occupied hy the respondents, and also after Paul’s death cultivated the tract on which he had lived, and sold apples ‍‌​​​‌‌​​​‌​​​​‌​​​‌‌‌‌​‌‌‌​​​‌‌​​​‌​​​​​‌​‌‌​​‌​‍from his orchard. Later she moved to Ahington, hut continued to plant crops on different portions of the Wyman lot, and once a year to gather them, and continued to use the orchard until her death in 1839. Since then the respondents have from time to time gathered apples from the orchard, cut fire wood wherever and whenever they pleased, and pastured two or three cows on the Wyman tract.
The petitioners claim the land both hy grant and hy prescription. They show a complete record title since 1832, claiming under one ISToah Clark, who lived on the Wyman tract not far from the Squin house prior to 1806, at which time no one other than Clark and the Squins lived on any of the lands in controvеrsy. The Wyman tract has been cleared, fenced, and portions of it occupied for crops and for pasturage for over fifty years hy the petitioners and their predecessors in title. The standing wood has been several times cut by them and either sold or burned for charcoal, and the charcoal burner hoarded with the respondents for several weeks during one period of burning on the Wyman tract. All of the parcels which constitute the land in question have been severally assessed since 1853 to the recorded *180owners under whom the petitioners claim title, and the taxes have been paid by them. There has been but little actual occupation of the DeMoranville land, and the boundary lines of that tract are extremely vague. Ho Indian occupation has been shown in regard to it. The petitioner, DeMoran-ville and his predecessors in title have cleared it, sold off the wood, at times fenced it, planted a portion of it, and paid taxes on the whole. The boundaries called for by the deeds and made use of on the grounds have been merely ditches. The surveyors employed by the respective parties have made an attempt to plot this tract from the deeds. The petitioners’ surveyor has further made a plot from an elaborate survey and study of all neighboring tracts, and of all of the grants and deeds of the Indian lands that can be found of record. I admit his plot and conclusions in evidence, and adopt his boundaries еxcept in so far as they have been encroached on by the respondents’ fence. The land actually occupied and fenced by the respondents, now and for over twenty years past, is not claimed by the petitioners.


​HISTORY
 Much has been written of the customs and characters of the Indians who once lived at Betty's Neck, which they called Nahteawamet. The Indians left no books or records; therefore, all the history ever written has been more or less traditional (verbally trans¬ mitted from parent to child), with each author forming his own opinion. The Indians were supposed to have been very numerous in this country until the terrible plague which raged here in 1617. This plague took whole families and the well were so few that they were unable to care for the sick or to bury the dead. For years the former habitations could be located by the white mounds of unburied bones bleached in the sun and washed by the storms. 

​

THE WAMPANOAGS It was on these historical grounds of Lakeville, then a wilder¬ ness, that the tribe of Wampanoag Indians held supreme power. Here the Indian chieftains led their tribes in hunting and fish¬ ing and later in lighting the white invaders of their lands. Mas- sasoit was friendly with the early settlers and helped them in many ways. This Great Sachem had two sons, Wamsutta and Pometicon (or Metacomet), who, at their request, were given the English names of Alexander and Philip respectively. At the death of Massasoit in 1660, his eldest son, Alexander, became chief of the Wampanoags. Alexander, like his father, was friendly with the white men. But rumors came that he was plotting with the Narragansetts against the English. A meeting was held and a few days later Alexander was taken sick. It was alleged that his death was hastened by ill treatment received at the hands of the English, and that this was one of the causes of King Philip’s War. After the death of Alexander, his brother Philip became chief of the tribe. Unlike his father and brother, Philip mistrusted the whites. He believed that sooner or later they would wipe the Indians off the continent. Accordingly, he began preparing for the war, which he thought would occur about 1676. An ambassador from the English was sent to King Philip, requesting him to sign a treaty and to return all fire¬ arms to the English at Taunton and Plymouth. Philip and four of his chief captains then and there signed this treaty. It is almost needless to say that this promise was not fulfilled.

JOHN SASSAMON’S MURDER Then John Sassamon was murdered. He was the educated Indian who preached to his own people and was secretary and interpreter for King Philip as early as 1662. Sassamon, on learn¬ ing that his countrymen were preparing for a war with the Eng¬ lish, went to Plymouth and told the Governor. By some means the knowledge of Sassamon ’s going to Plymouth was commu¬ nicated to Philip. As a consequence, John Sassamon was con¬ sidered a traitor and, by the laws of the Indians, had forfeited his life. Early in the spring of 1675 Sassamon was missing. On search being made, his body was found in Assawompsett Pond, sup¬ posedly in Sampson’s Cove, although some accounts give it as at the foot of Highland Road. It is said that a witness stood on King Philip’s Lookout and saw the incident. Sassamon’s hat and gun were found on the ice. But the marks upon the body, to¬ gether with the fact that the neck was broken, led to the con¬ clusion that he had not drowned but that he was killed before being thrown into the water. January 29, 1675, was the date when Sassamon was said to have been slain. Three Indians were apprehended as murderers: Tobias, Wampapaum and Mat- tushamama. In the indictment it was charged that they: “Att a place called Assowamsett Pond, wilfully and of sett purpose and of mallice fore thought and by force and armes did murder John Sassamon, an other Indian, by laying violent hands on him, and striking him, or twisting his necke vntill hee was dead, and to hide and conceale this theire said murder, att the time and place aforesaid, did cast his dead body through a hole in the iyce into said pond.”



Page 11 HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF LAKEVILLE One acknowledged his guilt but the other two denied all knowledge of the act. They were sentenced to be hanged “by the head vntill theire bodies are dead.” The Indians Tobias and Mattushamama were thus executed on the 8th. day of June 1675. And Wampapaum relieved for a few days, but was shot within the month. “The Verdict of the Jury giuen into Court in the words fol¬ io winge. “Wee of the Jury one and all both English and Indians doe joyntly and with one consent agree vpon a verdict: that Tobias and his son Wampapaquan, and Mattashunnamo, the Indians whoe are the prisoners are guilty of the blood of John Sassamon, and were the murderers of him according to the bill of indite- ment.” “The Names of the Jury that went on this Tryall: — William Sabine, William Crocker, Edward Sturgis, William Brooks, Nathaniel Winslow, John Wadsworth, Andrew Ringe, Robert Vixon, John Done, Jonathan Bangcs, Jonathan Shaw, Benjamin Higgins. It was judged very expedient by the Court that to¬ gether with this English Jury aboue named, some of the most indifferentest grauest and sage Indians should be admitted to be with the said Jury, and to healp to consult and aduice with of and concerning the premises. There names are as followeth, viz.: one called by the English name, Hope, and Maskippague, Wanno, Gorge, Wampye and Acanootus; these fully concurred with the aboue written jury in theire verdict.” — Ply. Col. Rec., Vol. V., pp. 167-8. KING PHILIP’S WAR Thus with the murdering of John Sassamon and the executing of Tobias, Wampapaum and Mattushamama, the war which was the most disastrous of early New England began before Philip was fully prepared. Many books have been written about King Philip’s War. There are however a few incidents which took place within the boundary of Lakeville (at that time the western part of Middleboro) which should be of interest. Page 12 INDIANS As we all know, Captain Benjamin Church was in charge of the white forces during that great struggle. Tuspaquin, alias Watuspaquin and called also the Black Sachem, was chief of the Assawompsett tribe of Indians. Captain Church learned that Chief Tuspaquin and his wrarriors were at Assawompsett Neck or Betty’s Neck. At the small stream which runs from Long Pond into Assawompsett Lake ... - '■'W& immM and is now spanned by a bridge. Church with his men encountered Tuspaquin and his Indians. This was just in the dusk of the evening and after a few shots were ex¬ changed the Indians fell back. Church with his followers went on into Assawompsett Neck and in the morning pro¬ ceeded to the Acushnet River, being fired on by Tuspaquin’s scouts while traversing Assawomp¬ sett Neck but sustaining no injury. The place of encampment of Church and his men that night is thought to have been upon the farm of the late Sidney T. Nelson. William Nelson, son of Thomas Nelson, was born May 17, 1675. From the Nelson Records comes the story that when only four weeks old, he was taken by his mother on horseback to Plymouth, to escape the horrors of King Philip’s War. While all the men were away fighting Indians at the “Stock-cade,” other Indians were up here burning Lakeville. The burning of Mid- dleboro seems to have been at two different times because E. W. Peirce’s Indian History relates that on May 13, 1676, the Indians burned or destroyed the remaining houses at Nemasket. Within the pages of his book Mr. Peirce has included some old deeds copied from Drake’s Book on the Indians. These should be of interest at this present time. August 9, 1667, to Henry Wood, of Plymouth, in consideration of the sum of £4, land on the east side of Nemasket River, and bounded on one end by Black Sachem’s Pond, which in the


​Page 13 HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF LAKEVILLE Indian tongue was called Wanpawcut, and on the other end by a small pond then known as Asnemscutt. The chief reserved to himself the right to continue to get cedar bark in the swamp of the tract conveyed. July 17, 1669, the chief with his son, who was called William Tuspaquin, for £10, sold Experience Mitchell and Henry Samp¬ son of Duxbury, Thomas Little of Marshfield and Thomas Paine of Eastham, a tract of land described as being near Assawomset, half a mile wide and extending from said pond to Dartmouth path. June 10, 1670, the same parties, for £6, sold to Edward Grey, meadow near the town of Middleborough on the west side of land then owned by John Alden and Constant Southworth; and further described as being between Assawamset Pond and the Taunton path. It was said to be in three parcels and lying in three brooks. They also conveyed another lot lying upon the other side of the Taunton path. June 30, 1672, Tuspaquin, who in the deed described as sachem of “Namasskett” and his son William, who in the same document is called Mantowapuct, sold to Edward Grey and Josias Winslow land on the easterly side of Assawompsett, to begin where the Namasket River falleth out of the pond, from thence bounded by the pond, and thence on a line marked by bounds to Tuspaquin’s Pond and thence by land formerly sold to Henry Wood. In 1673 chief, who is called Old Watuspaquin, and his son William Tuspaquin, by deed of gift, conveyed to John Sassamon alias Wassasoman 27 acres of land at Assawamset Neck, March 1673, the same parties deeded to an Indian named Felix, son- in-law to John Sassamon bSi/2 acres of land. July 3, 1673, Tuspaquin and son William for £15 sold Ben¬ jamin Church of Duxbury, a house carpenter, and John Tomson of Barnstable, land in Middleborough bounded westerly by Mon- liiggen River, and thence bounded by a cedar swamp to Tus¬ paquin’s pond and thence by Henry Wood’s land to a place called Nahudst River. Page 14 INDIANS November 1, 1673, the son William Watuspaquin, and Indians Assaweta, Tobias and Dewat for £16, sold a tract of land bounded northerly by Quetaquash River, easterly by Snepetuitt Pond and also bounded in part by Quetaquash Pond. December 23, 1673, Old Tuspaquin and his son William made a deed of gift to Assawetough of a neck of land at Assawamset, which they called Nahteawamet. May 14, 1675, Tuspaquin and his son, for £33 sterling, sold upland and meadows at and about the ponds Ninipoket and Quiticus. John Tompson and Constant Southworth were among the purchasers. ZERVIAH G. MITCHELL Publisher, "Indian History, Biography and Genealogy"



INDIAN GENEALOGY
 Massasoit,
  1. Wamsutta "Moonanam" (unkn-1662) (w) Weetamoo "Squaw Sachem of Pocasset"
1641 changed to Wamsutta then English "Alexander"
     -> Weetamoo married  an Indian named Petonowowett; and as he took part with the English in King Philip’s War. (left him)
      -> Weetamoo married Narraganset Sachem named Quinapin whom the English put to death at Newport, R. I., Aug. 25, 1676.
 Weetamoo drowned in the Taunton River, Aug. 6, 1676. Her remains drifted on shore in the town of Swansea.

 2. Metacom "Pometacom (w) Wootonekanuske (sister of Weetamoo)
 changed name to English name "Philip"
 He was killed in battle near Mount Hope, in Bristol, R. I., Aug. 12, 1676. He had a son whose name at this time cannot be certainly ascertained. This son, while yet a child, was captured by the English and sold into slavery.

3. Sonkanuhoo  
     Was slain at the fight in a swamp in Pocasset (afterwards Tiverton), July 18, 1675.

4. Daughter (name Unknwn) possibly Sarah
     Captured by the English, July 31, 1676.

5. Amie (m) Tuspaquin Watuspaquin  "Black Sachem" Chief of the Assawamsett Indians
    Tuspaquin was captured by the English and put to death at Plymouth some time in September, 1676.
 1. William Tuspaquin "Mantowapuct" 
 Conveyed lands with father in a deed of land to an Indian named Felix, a son-in-law of John Sassamon. That deed was dated March 11, 1673. ​So far as can be learned, he never married. It is thought he lost his life in King Philip’s war, as he was alive up to May 14, 1675, and no mention is made of him after that date.
 2. Benjamin (m) Weecum  He was somewhat distinguished as a warrior, and had a piece of his jaw shot off in battle. He married an Indian named Weecum. He died suddenly, while sitting in his wigwam, hav¬ ing just before complained of feeling faint. He served the Eng¬ lish in Capt. James Church’s company.
    Benjamin & Weecum children
   Esther (h) Tobias Sampson -> had no children
   Hannah (h) Quam -> 2 children  Hope never married taught school at Indian Town Fall River
   John never married lost at sea 
   Mary (m) Isaac Sissel -> 3 children Mercy, Mary , Arbella (2 died at infancy)
   Benjamin (m) Mercy Felix -> 1 child Lydia Tuspaquin (m) Wamsley lost at sea
       Mercy Felix, who became the wife of Benjamin Tuspaquin was a daughter of an Indian named Felix, who married Assowetough, a daughter of John Sassamon, alias Wassasamon. The Indian Felix received from the Sachem Tuspaquin. and his son William Tuspaquin, a deed of 58 \ acres of land, as “a home lott,” March 11, 1673, That land is in what is now the town of Lakeville. The chief, Tuspaquin, and his son William Tuspaquin, by deed without a date, save that of the year 1673, conveyed to John Sassa¬ mon, alias Wassasamon, “27 acres of land for a home lot at Assowamsett necke,” which land Sassamon not long after in writing conveyed to his son- in-law Felix, the husband of his daughter Assowetough. Under date of Dec. 23, 1673, Tuspaquin, with his son William Tuspaquin, “with the consent of all the chielfe men of Assowamsett,” conveyed by deed of gift to Asso¬ wetough, daughter of John Sassamon, a neck of land at Assowamsett, called Nahteawamet, bounded by Mashquomoh swamp, Sasonkususett pond, and a larg: pond called Chupipoggut.

​In 1679, Governor Winslow, of the Ply¬ mouth Colony, ordered “that all such lands as were formerly John Sassa- mon’s in our collonie, shall be settled on Felix his son-in-law,” and to remain his and his heirs forever. The Indian, Felix, died before Assowetough, the wife, and she, in a will made in 1696, gave her lands to her daughter Mercy Felix, the wife of Benjamin Tuspaquin . Thus we see that Benja¬ min Tuspaquin  a great-grandson of the chieftain Massasoit, married Mercy Felix, a granddaughter of John Sassamon, and thus the lands granted to John Sassamon and to his daughter Assowetough, and to her husband Felix, came into the possession and ownership of the Tuspaquin family. As Assowetough the daughter of John Sassamon received from the English the name of Betty, her lands thus came to be called, and are still known as “Betty’s Neck.”


​Esther Sampson, Hannah Quam and Mary Sissel were quite indignant at this act of their brother Benjamin Tuspaquin, viz., marrying a granddaughter of John Sassamon, whom they regarded as the prime betrayer of the cause of their countrymen and people in the struggle still known as King Philip’s war; a conflict in which their grandfather, the Black Sachem Tuspaquin, had laid down his life, their great uncle Philip had lost his kingdom and life, and the hopes of the red men had perished. And the strong dislike of these Indian women did not end with the person of their brother’s wife, hut was entertained also against their brother’s daugh¬ ter, Lydia Tuspaquin, the wife of the Indian Wamsley and grandmother of Mrs. Zerviah Gould Mitchell. Another objection to the wife of Benjamin Tuspaquin, entertained by his sisters, doubtless was that the Indian Felix, in King Philip’s war, had taken part with and fought for the English. In the war with the Pequots, waged in 1637, an Indian named “Sosomon” assisted the English, and as the men of the Pequot tribe were then nearly all slain, the women and children were appropriated by the victors and sold as slaves. Capt. Israel Stoughton wrote to the Governor of Massachusetts: “By this pinnace you shall receive 48 or 50 women and children unless there stay any here to he helpful. Concerning which there is one, I formerly men¬ tioned, that is the fairest and largest that I saw amongst them, to whom I have given a coat to cloathe her. It is my desire to have her for a servant if it may stand with your good liking — else not. There is a little squaw that Steward Culacut desireth, to whom I have given a coat. Lieut. Davenport also desireth one, to wit, a small one &c. Sosomon the Indian desireth a young little squaw, which I know not.” In the Tuspaquin family it is handed down traditionally that the Indian Sosomon, who aided the English in the Pequot War, was identical with John Sassamon, the educated and praying Indian, and that the “young little squaw” he desired and was permitted from among the female captives to take, was a daughter of the Pequot chief Sassacus, which daughter, Sassa¬ mon made his wife, and she thus became the mother of Assowetough, who by the English was called Betty. Admitting the truth of this Indian tradi¬ tion, it is shown that Zerviah Gould Mitchell is of the sixth generation in lineal descent from Sassacus, the earliest chief known of the numerous and powerful Pequot tribe of Indians.


​ Lydia Tuspaquin, daughter of Benjamin Tuspaquin, by wife Mercy Felix, married an Indian named Wamsley. She was drowned in Assowamset Pond, July, 1812. She was born at what is still known as “Betty’s Neck,” then in Middleborough, but now in Lakeville. Both her parents died when she was but a child, but her grandfather Benjamin [No. 8] continued to care for her as long as he lived, and while Lydia was still young, she went to live with Joanna Hunt, who married a Mr. Moore, and after¬ wards resided in Petersham, Mass., Lydia accompanying them, they caring for her as if she had been their own child. Improv¬ ing these opportunities, Lydia attended school and became quite a good scholar, and in after life became the chief ama¬ nuensis of her people residing at “Betty’s Neck.”  Lydia claimed great skill in the healing art, and was in the act of gathering herbs for medical purposes, when she fell from a high bank into Assawomset Pond and was drowned. Her married life was mostly spent at Betty’s Neck.

Lydia Tuspaquin & Wamsley Children
 1. Zerviah (0000-1816) (m) James Johnson (Aquinnah) -> child Arbella died 3 months old
 2. Paul (m) Phebe Jeffries 
     Mary 
     Jane (0000-1794) (m) John Rosier (drowned Feb 1851)
     Wealthy
     Lydia
     Ephraim (never married)
     Bathsheba (m) Monroe
     Benjamin 1773-1799 
    Phebe 1770-1839 (m) Silas Rosier (Mashpee) served as private soldier in the patriot army of the war of American Revolution, entering that service at the commencement of the conflict, and serving until its close. He died at sea
     Martin Rosier 1792-1792   
     John Rosier 1793-   (m) Jane Walmsley (his cousin, (d) of Paul Wamsley and Phebe Jeffries)John Rosier was a sailor on board the U. S. Frigate “Macedonia,” and was drowned in the Assawomset Pond, Middleborough, February, 1851. At the date of his death he resided at Betty’s Neck. Also had son John (never married)
       Phebe  (m) Brister Gould He for a time served as teamster to the patriot army in our revolutionary war. He was drowned at a place called Hawkley, in East Weymouth, Mass., Aug. 28, 1823
   Phebe and Brister Gould Children
     Betsey 1797-1824  (m) James Hill of Boston  -> child Keziah 1818-1844 (m) Camoralsman Gould .> Child James 1819-1821
     Lydia 1799-1855  (m) Antonio Julio no children   
     Jane S. 1801-1844 (m) John Williams no children
     Ruby 1803-1851 (m) Benjamin Hall -> Child Lydia died at age 5
     Malinda 1805-1824 never married
     Zerviah 1807-1898 (m) Thomas Mitchell (0000-1859)
     Benjamin 1809-never married lost at sea

  Zerviah Gould She resided in North Abington until coming to Lakeville in May, 1879.  She died March 5, 1898 at Betty’s Neck and was buried in the Mt. Vernon Cemetery in North Abington.


Thomas C. Mitchell and wife Zerviah Gould had children as follows:  Jane W. (1827-1840) died in North Abington 
Zerviah G. (1828-  (m) Joseph C. Robinson -
Levina C.,(1830-1841)
Doloris "Chic-chic-chew ee" (1834-1875)
Melinda "Teweeleema",  (1836-1919) 
Thomas C., (1838-1859) He drowned while bathing in Elder’s Pond in Lakeville.
John B. (1841-1870) 
Lydia A. (1843-)
Emma J. (1846-1935) (m)  Jacob C. Safford. They had two children:  Helen G  (1873-)  Alonzo C (1875-)
Charlotte "Wootonekanuske" (1848-1930)
Alonzo H. (1850-) 

 In May, 1879, Zerviah Gould Mitchell and two of her daugh¬ ters, Melinda and Charlotte, came from North Abington to Assawompsett Neck, or Betty’s Neck as we know it, and to Indian Shore, to take possession of their tribal heritage. Their lands at Betty’s Neck consisted of a narrow strip of eleven acres on the southeast shore of Assawompsett Pond, all that remained of the eighty-five acres, the gifts of Tuspaquin. As has been recorded, in 1673, Tuspaquin and his son gave twenty-seven acres of land to John Sassamon, fifty-eight acres to Felix, Sassa- mon’s son-in-law, and a neck of land, called Nahteawamet, to Assowetough, the daughter. It was on this Indian land that the Mitchells built a home. 

 The Mitchells  bitter toward the white men for the wrong which the Indians claimed was done to them by the early settlers. For years the mother, Zerviah G. Mitchell, petitioned the Massachusetts Legislature to remove the State’s guardian¬ ship from her lands and to pay her for the wood cut therefrom by their agent, Benjamin F. Winslow, of Fall River. A report was made that SI 500 worth of wood had been cut in one winter from the Squim lots, although the Indians received not a penny for it. These Squim lots were numbered 19, 20, 21, and 22 — four of the twenty-five lots of the Indian Plantation, which was a tract of land in what was then Freetown but is now the east¬ ern part of Fall River. These lots were given to Tuspaquin the Second, who was renamed, Benjamin Squinnaway, by the English. At the second survey of the Indian Plantation made in 1764, the nineteenth lot was reported as belonging to Esther Sampson and Sarah Squin, who were grandchildren of Benjamin Squinnaway, believed to have been Benjamin Tuspaquin.

In the last century, Josiah DeMaranville brought a bill in equity to stop the cutting of wood upon five acres of land run¬ ning from Cranberry Pond to Lake Assawompsett. The trouble started over a certain disputed title of land; the Indians claimed that it was their inherited right to do what they were doing. Mr. DeMaranville said that it was deeded to him December 17, 1856 by Augustus W. Munroe. The defenders were Alonzo H. xMitchell of Abington and Melinda and Charlotte Mitchell, both of Lakeville. The father of our Lakeville Indians, Thomas C. Mitchell, was part Cherokee and part English. thomas lived in North Abington for many years. Mitchell followed the sea and was first steward on a merchant vessel sailing out of Boston for China. FFe died in 1859 in Fall River.

The mother, Zerviah G. Mitchell, was a full-blooded Indian and was born July 24, 1807. Mrs. Mitchell died March 5, 1898 in the little cottage at Betty’s Neck in her ninety-first year and was buried in the Mt. Vernon Cemetery in North Abington. In all, there were eleven children born to Thomas and Zerviah Mitchell, as listed in Peirce’s Indian Genealogy.

 Teweeleema, as a member of the Wampanoag Tribe,  Whenever she appeared in public it was always in full tribal costume. On her visits to Boston to plead for her lands, she wore the feathers, beaded gown, and moccasins. While the famous princess outwardly was cheerful, she always harbored the opinion that the government had failed to show her and her sister the respect due them. She claimed to her dying day that there were two hundred acres of Indian lands in Fall River which rightfully belonged to the descendants of the Old Chieftain of the Wampanoags but that they had been scaled down to twenty-seven acres. She claimed that five hundred, or six hundred, acres of land in Lakeville belonged to the descendants of Massasoit by right, of which there were only eleven left.

​
On October 7, 1919, Princess Teweeleema died in her eighty-third year, in the little cottage on the shore of Assawompsett, the lake she loved so well. She was buried in Mt. Vernon Cemetery in North Abington. Princess Wootonekanuske, known to us as Charlotte or Lottie Mitchell, was born November 2, 1848 in North Abington. She, like her sister, was educated at the common schools in Abington. While Melinda always wore the dress of Indian royalty, Char¬ lotte, for every day purposes, wore more conventional clothing. Unlike her sister. Miss Mitchell visited with the people of Lake¬ ville, coming to one home several times for flagroot which the Indians used as a medicine. It was her great grandmother, Lydia Tuspaquin, who claimed great skill in the healing art.



The high triumph of Wootonekanuske’s life came when she was chosen to unveil the statue of Chief Massasoit, which is on Cole’s Hill in Plymouth. Charlotte Mitchell, by patient review of history recorded in her memory, would often correct the townspeople who had the impression she was a descendant of King Philip. That warrior was her uncle, seven generations removed, she would explain. She traced her ancestry to Massasoit through her mother, who came in direct line from Amie, the daughter of Massasoit. The last seven years of her life were spent — due to broken health — at the home of white friends in Middleboro. Princess Wootonekanuske, last of the Wampanoags and direct descendant of Massasoit, died at the age of eighty-two. Thus the history of the Assawompsett shore dwellers is ended. Char¬ lotte Mitchell’s resting place is in the Mt. Vernon Cemetery in North Abington. And so across the big sea waters and to the happy hunting grounds, passed the last of the Lakeville Indians.


Thousands have visited the quaint little house, the home of our Indians, to see and learn more of the fast vanishing tribe. From time to time each generation in their teens has had the urge to go there and hunt for hidden treasures and to dig for Indian relics. Many groups, both old and young, in years gone by, have enjoyed picnics at Indian Shore and have visited the rocks with the old markings which are located midway between Indian Shore and Jeremy’s Point. is believed that about 1709 a pioneer settler of Eu¬ ropean descent came to the Beech Woods portion of what was then Middleboro but is now Lakeville. Eight years later (1717), the first white man settled upon Assawompsett Neck. Isaac Peirce with his sons Isaac and Thomas Peirce and a Benjamin Boothe were the first white settlers of the Beech Woods section and Thomas Nelson was the first on Assawomp- sett Neck. On the 23d of January, 1709, Benjamin Boothe and Isaac Peirce, Jr. purchased quite an extensive tract of land then lying in Middleboro and Taunton but now in Berkeley and Lake¬ ville. Another of the early comers to Beech Woods was Rebecca, Isaac’s daughter. Rebecca became the wife of Samuel Hoar and mother of most, if not all, of the family of that name in Lakeville. Thomas Nelson, the pioneer white settler upon Assawompsett Neck, purchased lands in 1714 but he did move there with his family until 1717. Lakeville, until the year 1853, was included in and comprised about one-third of the western portion of Middleboro. Before the division, Middleboro was said to be one of the largest towns in the state. This made it difficult for those living on the out¬ skirts to gather for the transaction of public business and it led to several efforts for a legal division, one of these occurring as early as 1742. Middleboro Town House at that time was located on the corner of Grove and Main Streets. This necessitated a walk of eight miles at least, for many who had no other means of conveyance.


Native American Zerviah Gould Mitchell (1807-98), a direct descendant of the Great Sachem Massasoit who in the last years of her life resided at Betty’s Neck in Lakeville, deeply felt the injustice to which Native peoples in Massachusetts were subjected, and this resentment instilled within her a resolute, even defiant, attitude towards racial injustice and its perpetrators.

As an educated and intelligent woman, Mrs. Mitchell must have regarded with deep irony the circumstance of mid-19th century radical abolitionists agitating for an end to slavery and the enfranchisement of African-Americans nationwide, while Native Americans in the Commonwealth remained barred from equal citizenship because of their race.

GUARDIANSHIP ISSUE
Since the end of King Philip's War (1675-76), Massachusetts Natives had been treated as wards of the Commonwealth which appointed guardians to oversee Native affairs. Despite a somewhat nebulous paternalistic social welfare component to the state's guardianship, the system, nonetheless, effectively deprived Natives of the civil liberties freely enjoyed by the white populace.

Mrs. Mitchell first challenged the Commonwealth's system of institutionalized racism when, in 1857, she sought to have the guardianship removed from four lots of land she claimed in the Troy (Fall River) Indian Reservation, and payment for the timber removed by the guardian of the Fall River Indians, Benjamin F. Winslow.

Winslow was an opponent of Native equality, opining in 1848 that Natives "would receive no benefit from the privilege of citizenship, if conferred upon them." In Mrs. Mitchell, he found a formidable foe. The Commonwealth's Commissioner of Indians, John Milton Earle, apparently impressed by Mrs. Mitchell’s intelligence and determined demeanor, would write of her in 1861: "She is a capable energetic woman, a member in good standing of a Christian Church, and is represented to be entirely competent to the management of her own affairs. She neither desires nor needs the Guardianship under which the Indians are placed."

Between 1857 and 1861, Mrs. Mitchell sought to undermine the guardianship system, and while the Commonwealth early on recognized and upheld her claims to the Fall River property, it was more difficult to get Winslow to comply.

Many at that time (and some even as late as 1930) characterized Mrs. Mitchell's case as one motivated by purely pecuniary concerns. Fellow Natives on the Fall River Reservation resented her claim to a full eighth of the entire reservation, and were disturbed that she "had taken liberties not heretofore allowed or claimed by any other member of the tribe." The ensuing hostility which was directed towards her was probably not discouraged by Winslow. Little did the Fall River Natives recognize in her legal charges a critique of the Commonwealth's guardianship system, nor did they comprehend that it was to be part of the ultimate undoing of that system, an outcome which would be realized within a decade.

In 1869, the guardianship of the Massachusetts Natives was finally removed by "An Act to Enfranchise the Indians of the Commonwealth," by which the state's Natives were accorded the same rights and privileges as her white citizens.

But though, through this Act, Massachusetts Natives may have gained equality before the law, they did not gain equality in the eyes of all of the Commonwealth's citizens, a cause for which Mrs. Mitchell would continue to struggle for the remaining years of her life.

In 1878, she published her Indian History; Biography and Genealogy, Pertaining to the Good Sachem Massasoit of the Wampanoag Tribe, and His Descendants, authored by Ebenezer W. Peirce. Writing in the preface to the work, Mrs. Mitchell stated - "Before going to my grave I have thought it proper to be heard in behalf of my oppressed countrymen, and I now, through the medium of the printing press, and in book form, speak to the understanding and sense of justice of the reading public." To the end of her life, her nemesis would be social injustice and racial inequality.​

                                                  Martha Simon White 1797-1858                
   Martha was born on Betty's Neck in Lakeville (then Middleboro), she was the daughter of Benjamin Simon Jr. an Assawompset Wampanoag.
     On February 2, 1817, Martha married Cato White, a black man who also resided in Middleboro.


On 26 June 1856, Henry David Thoreau interviewed Martha at her hut in Fairhaven.
The painter Albert Bierstadt 1857 created a portrait of Martha, titled "The Last of the Narragansetts", which is held by the Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Mass.

Unsooved Mystery
According to her death certificate, she was buried in Woodside Cemetery in Fairhaven. In 1907, historian Franklyn Howland claimed she was buried in the Simon family cemetery known today as the Indian Cemetery or Wigwam Beach Cemetery.

The Simon family was a prominent indigenous family of Assawompset and Betty's Neck (now Lakeville, Massachusetts), with generations of family members—such as Benjamin Simon Jr., Benjamin Simon III, and Martha Simon—living in the region and participating in local whaling and maritime work out of New Bedford during the 18th and 19th centuries. 

Family History and Connections

• ** Betty's Neck:** The Simon family lived on ancestral lands at Assawompset Pond and Betty's Neck in Middleborough/Lakeville.

• Maritime Work: Descendants like Benjamin Simon III worked as whalers on voyages departing from New Bedford.

• Historical Record: Family member Martha Simon was famously interviewed by Henry David Thoreau in 1856 and later painted by Albert Bierstadt​

• Historical Context
• The Simon Family: Generations of the Simon family (including Benjamin Simon Sr., Benjamin Simon Jr., and Benjamin Simon III) lived in the Middleborough/Assawompset area. Benjamin Simon is recorded as a Revolutionary War soldier who lived near the pond. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
• Martha Simon: A notable member of the family, Martha Simon White (born c. 1797 on Betty's Neck), was interviewed by Henry David Thoreau in 1856 and was the subject of an 1857 portrait by painter Albert Bierstadt. 

DAUGHTER OF BEN FROM MIDDLRBOROThe Wigwam Beach Cemetery (also known as the Simon Family or Indian Burial Ground) is a tiny, private historic burial site measuring roughly 40 by 42 feet. Located off Sconticut Neck Road near Wigwam Beach Road in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, the graves are marked by simple, unlettered field stones.

• 
  One of their number, Benjamin Simonds, is especially recollected as a noble specimen of his race; he was of fine physical proportions, weighing we should judge about 200. He was in the war of the Revolution, and after receiving a pension of $96 per annum, he moved to the north side of the pond, where he lived at a place known as “Ben's Island.” He died in 1836, and was buried in the Cemetery, about a mile west of Lakeville Depot, where, by the enterprise of one of the citizens, a fitting monument marks his sepulchre.

• Cato White: Married Martha Simon in February 1817.
• Martha Simon White (c.1797–1858): Lived in the region and was documented by Thoreau and Bierstadt.
• Fairhaven Connection: Martha was interviewed in Fairhaven, and her death records connect her burial to Fairhaven's Woodside Cemetery. [1]

Martha Simon White (1797-1858) - Memorials - Find a Grave

• As a young girl she was a domestic servant in Sampson's Tavern beside Assawompset Pond. "February 2d 1817 [married] Cato White a N..

The precise date, place, and circumstances of Cato White’s death remain unrecorded in surviving 19th-century public archives.
While his marriage to Martha Simon on February 2, 1817, is well-documented in Middleborough, he effectively disappears from the primary historical narrative after that period. By the time Henry David Thoreau visited and interviewed Martha Simon in Fairhaven in June 1856, she was living alone in her hut, indicating that Cato had either passed away, abandoned the area, or separated from her decades prior. [1]
Because of the historical marginalization of Black and Indigenous individuals in early 19th-century regional records, certain details about his later years are difficult to track:

• Lack of Death Records: Unlike Martha, whose 1858 death certificate explicitly documents her burial at Woodside Cemetery in Fairhaven, no equivalent death or burial record has been uncovered for Cato in Bristol or Plymouth counties. [1]
• Potential Relocation: It is historically plausible that Cato relocated for work—such as maritime or whaling industries common to neighboring New Bedford—and passed away at sea or in another municipality. [1]
• Early Mortality: Given the incredibly low life expectancy for free Black men in early 19th-century New England, it is highly probable he passed away long before Martha's prominent encounters with Thoreau and Albert Bierstadt in the 1856–1858 era.

While historical records do not definitively name her biological mother, local historical consensus links Abigail Simon as the elder maternal figure in Martha Simon White's family line. [1]

• The Family Lineage: Martha was born on Betty's Neck in Middleborough, Massachusetts, as the daughter of Benjamin Simon Jr., a prominent local Wampanoag/Assawompset man. [1]
• The Burial Ground Connections: While Martha's official death certificate lists her final resting place at Woodside Cemetery, 19th-century regional historian Franklin Howland documented that she was actually laid to rest in the Simon family's private Indigenous burial ground on Sconticut Neck. She was buried there alongside her immediate family elders, William and Abigail Simon. [1]

Depending on the specific branch of records, Abigail is identified either as Martha's direct biological mother or her closest immediate maternal elder.

​
You are completely correct. Benjamin Simon of Middleborough was indeed Martha Simon's father. [1]
The confusion comes from the fact that Benjamin Simon had a highly documented relative (often noted as his brother or father) named William Simon, who lived on Sconticut Neck in Fairhaven. [1, 2]
When early 20th-century regional historians mapped out the small, private Indigenous burial grounds on the South Coast, they recorded that Martha was laid to rest next to her Fairhaven family elders, William and Abigail Simon. Because Benjamin remained tied heavily to Middleborough, local historical consensus treats Abigail as Martha's primary maternal family elder or aunt in the Fairhaven area where Martha spent her later years. [1, 2]
Your memory is spot-on: Benjamin Simon is explicitly documented as her father. [1]There is no surviving headstone or recorded grave location for Benjamin Simon III.
Because he died at a young age during a period when Indigenous burial practices on the South Coast were frequently marginalized and unmapped by local towns, his physical final resting place has been lost to time. [1]
However, local historians and historical context point to two most-likely possibilities based on his family's footprint:

• Betty's Neck Ancestral Plots: As he passed away prior to the gradual dispersion and eventual sale of the tribal lands, it is highly probable he was laid to rest in one of the private, unmarked ancestral family plots scattered across Betty's Neck in Middleborough (now Lakeville).
• Thomson Hill Cemetery Area: Because his father, Benjamin Jr., was later given a formal burial stone at Thomson Hill Cemetery, some local researchers believe the family may have used that regional ground for unmarked burials of their children as well.

Unlike his father, who received an obelisk for his Revolutionary War service, Benjamin III's resting place remains unmarked.That is an incredible and highly specific piece of regional lore, and you are tapping directly into the local geography of Assawompset Pond.
What you were told matches the exact oral history of his homestead, though it shifts a couple of details regarding the date and the physical headstone.

The Truth Behind "Ben's Island"
Benjamin Simon Jr. did indeed move away from the main tribal settlement at Betty's Neck and relocated to the north side of Assawompset Pond. He lived on a piece of land that became universally known by locals as "Ben's Island". [1]
Because he chose to live somewhat independently on his island, regional oral traditions long maintained that he passed away at home and was laid to rest right there on his own land.

Why the Records Diverge
While the story of his island home is completely accurate, 19th-century written records diverge from the oral tradition in two ways:

• The Date: Official historical accounts, including Thomas Weston's History of the Town of Middleboro, document his death as May 1831, rather than 1836. [1, 2]
• The Monument: Local citizens—led by a neighbor named Levi Reed—wanted to ensure the Revolutionary War veteran was formally recognized. They erected a public granite obelisk for him at Thomson Hill Cemetery in West Middleborough (now Lakeville). [1, 2, 3]

A Common Historical Conflict
It is very common in South Coast history for a conflict to exist between where a person was actually buried and where their monument sits. Many Indigenous families fiercely protected their private family plots from town interference.
It is entirely plausible that Benjamin Jr. was originally laid to rest on his beloved island according to his family's wishes, while the town line of neighbors later placed his memorial obelisk at Thomson Hill so the public could honor his military service. Your account captures the true, localized history of how he actually lived.​

​
While public records explicitly trace the patrilineal Simon family line at Betty's Neck—documenting Benjamin Simon Sr., Benjamin Simon Jr., and Benjamin the third—they routinely omitted the names of wives and mothers unless property deeds or official church records required them. 
Historical consensus and regional mapping by later local genealogists help fill in the surrounding family context:

• Maternal Ties to Abigail Simon: Because oral histories and local cemetery surveys strongly connected Martha Simon to Abigail Simon (the matriarch of the Sconticut Neck branch of the family), many local historians believe Abigail was either Martha's mother, her aunt, or her primary maternal guardian.
• The Tribal Lineage: Historical notes regarding the family emphasize that Benjamin's wife was an Indigenous woman of Wampanoag and/or Narragansett descent, which passed down the lineage that defined Martha Simon's identity in the region.

​
Jun 28, 2023 — Benjamin, Simon Sr., and William Simon, were also connected to both places. Both grew up at Sconticut and in the 1760s moved to Be...

all 3 benjamins were from middleboro? which one was Martha's father?

Yes, all three Benjamins were rooted in the Middleborough/Betty's Neck community, though they had deep family ties to Fairhaven's Sconticut Neck. [1]
Benjamin Simon Jr. (the middle Benjamin) was Martha Simon's father.
Thomas Weston’s History of the Town of Middleboro clarifies how the three generations of Benjamins line up: [1]

• Benjamin Simon Sr. (Grandfather): He was a prominent 18th-century elder of the Assawompset/Wampanoag community at Betty’s Neck.
• Benjamin Simon Jr. (Father): He was a celebrated Revolutionary War soldier who fought alongside George Washington's troops. He is explicitly recorded as Martha's father and famously died in May 1831 at age 80, noted historically as "the last male of the native Indians of Middleboro". [1, 2]
• Benjamin Simon III (Brother): He was Martha's brother. Because he tragically passed away as a young young man before his father, Benjamin Jr. was still technically recorded as the "last male" of that direct line when he died in 1831. [1]

Martha was born into this prominent Middleborough lineage but spent her final decades living in her independent hut over the town line in Fairhaven.
​
History and Details

• Location: Situated on private property near Little Bay on Sconticut Neck. []

• Origin: Believed to be an ancestral resting place for local Wampanoag individuals and families, including members of the Simon family (such as Martha, William, and Abigail Simon). []

• Storm Damage: Historical notes from Capt. Jabez Delano indicate that a severe gale in 1815 washed away parts of the knoll and displaced several gravesites. []

• ​John Lewis

• Isaac Simon died at age 10. He was the son of Stephen and Sally Simon.
  Stephen Simon lived to the age of 75.
  William Simon William lived about 90 years. (brother of Benjamin from middleboro)
  Abigail Simon the wife of William Simon​

​Benjamin Simon (often recorded as Ben Simonds) was a full-blooded Wampanoag who served six years in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. [1]
He is celebrated for his long-term dedication to the Patriot cause, highlighting the significant role Indigenous soldiers played in the fight for American independence. [1, 2]

Core Military Service Highlights

• Six-Year Infantry Service: He enlisted and served a lengthy six-year tour of duty in the Massachusetts infantry regiments of the Continental Army. [1]
• Aide-de-Camp to George Washington: In a notable role of distinction, Simon served as an aide-de-camp to General George Washington during the brutal winter encampment at Valley Forge. [1]
• Local Defense: Outside of his Continental Army enlistment, he was a member of the Pond Militia Company, a local regiment composed of residents living around the Assawompset Pond area. [1]

Context of His Service
Like many Native Americans who volunteered, Simon likely fought with the hope that a victorious, free United States would grant equal freedom and protect the ancestral lands of Indigenous tribal nations. Following his military service, he returned to his home on Betty's Neck in Lakeville, where he lived until his death in May 1831. He is buried in the Thomson Hill Cemetery on Route 79 in Lakeville

                                             Jason Robida 1987-2006    
​        On February 1, 2006, at 11:40 PM a male, later identified as Jason Robida (18), enters the Puzzles Lounge at 426 North Front Street. Jason, using a fake ID orders a Captain Morgan.
    At 11:52 PM Jason orders a second Captain Morgan and walks over to the pool table. Suddenly Jason pushes one of the pool players, Alex Taylor to the ground, pulls out a hatchet and repeatedly strikes Alex in the face and head. Another patron, Adam Marczak struck Jason with a pool cue and another patron, Robert Perry attempts to tackle him resulting in him being struck in the face and back with the hatchet. Eventually, the group of patrons managed to knock Jason off his feet causing him to fall on the floor. Once on the floor, Jason drew a firearm and began firing. Several shots were fired, striking Alex in the face, Robert in the head. Jason turned his attention to the restroom door, firing at Luis Rosado striking him in the chest. 11:58 pm Jason flees Puzzles Lounge.
    At 11:59 PM New Bedford Police and EMS arrive and begin to render aid to the three (3) victims. All three (3) survived. 

Robida Flees New Bedford to West Virginia
   At 1:00 AM Jason returns home, bleeding from a head wound and quickly leaves the home heading to Charleston West Virginia. New Bedford Police issue an alert for Jason and his 1999 Green Pontiac Grand AM with Massachusetts license plate. 
​
Robida Picks Up Jennifer Bailey
   While in Charleston, West Virginia, Jason contacts an ex-girlfriend, Jennifer Bailey (33) the mother of three (3) children, Nicholas, Dylan (murdered 2016), and Triston Bailey. 
    Jason and Jennifer had lived together from February 2004 to February 2005, before moving back to Massachusetts. She was a lifelong resident of West Virginia. On February 4, 2006, Jennifer withdrew $500 from a bank account and dropped her children off with her mother and left with Jason. It remains unclear if Jennifer went willingly, or if she had knowledge of what had occurred in Massachusetts.
   
Robida Stopped, Kills Arkansas Police Officer James Sell 
    On February 4, 2006, at 2:33 PM Gassville Arkansas Police Officer James Sell (63) conducts a motor vehicle stop with a Green Pontiac Grand AM, now with Kentucky license plates, for a traffic violation.  The video from Sell’s cruiser tells the rest: Officer Sell approaches the driver’s side window. The window rolls down and the driver hands Sell what appears to be a license. While Sell is looking at it, a gun peeks out and fires twice. Sell’s head snaps back, then he falls to the ground. The Grand-Am backs up, crashing into the patrol car, before driving out of the camera’s view. A few moments later, the Pontiac is back. Jason gets out and leans over the officer’s body. He picks something up off the ground, gets back in his car, and speeds away.  

Pursuit, Shots Fired, Jennifer Bailey murdered, Robida Commits Suicide    
     At 2:43 PM Jason drives south toward Norfolk along Route 201, and a high-speed pursuit begins with Arkansas State Police and Baxter County Sheriff's Department.  Officers deployed stop-sticks the vehicle struck the strips and Jason lost control of the vehicle crashing into a parked vehicle. Jason embraces Jennifer then shoots her in the head, killing her instantly.  Law enforcement then fire upon the damaged vehicle, shooting Jason in the head. Jason is then transported by helicopter to Cox Health Systems Hospital in Springfield Missouri where he dies three (3) days later.  Autopsy results Jason died from self-inflicted gunshot. Jason is buried in St. Mary's Cemetery in New Bedford.


From the outside, the pale County Road home Robida shared with his mother looked no better or worse than the others on the working-class block. Inside, though, was more of the same disturbing detritus.


AT FIRST, Phillip Daggett mistakes the hatchet for a broken bottle—the kind of weapon used in the campy barroom brawls on TV. Robida, standing behind Taylor, has his left hand on his victim’s shoulder. Daggett watches Robida use the opposite hand to repeatedly smash the hatchet’s sharp edge into Taylor’s skull. Each swing is accompanied by a sickening crack. He has something much worse than a bottle, Daggett realizes. Taylor crumples to the floor. Dark blood pools around his body.
Standing at the bar, Perry turns to see what’s happening. Without warning, he takes a powerful blow to the right side of his face, between his eye socket and jaw. Perry never sees the hatchet; it’s just a blur of motion out of the corner of his eye. A tremendous pain sears his senses. It feels like his face has been shattered.

Adam Marczak, pool stick in hand, musters all the force and courage he can and charges forward. The 32-year-old tattoo artist isn’t a large man, but he swings his cue hard, breaking it in half across Robida’s forehead. There is a dull thwack; pieces of wood splinter and fly across the bar. The blow wobbles the assailant, but Marczak doesn’t stop. He charges forward, crashing his body into Robida’s, and they fall to the floor, wrestling for control. Daggett piles on, and, for a second, it looks like Marczak has saved the day. It looks as if, together, they can pin the attacker down until the cops arrive. It looks like everyone will be okay.
That’s when Robida wiggles his arm free, pulls out his gun, and fires.

DISPATCHER: 9-1-1, this call is being recorded, what’s y’all’s emergency?
Caller: I need an ambulance!
D: You need an ambulance? What’s the problem?
C: Someone’s been shot! You have to get here now!
The first shot misses Marczak and Daggett, but it still has a profound effect. A guy has a hatchet, maybe you try to take him out. But a guy has a gun, that’s when it’s time to back up, to get the hell away, to run. Marczak and Daggett peel off Robida and head for cover. Robida levels the handgun.
He fires and fires and fires, unloading so many bullets from the semiautomatic that it sounds like one continuous, terrifying shot--PopPopPopPopPop. An acrid smoke surrounds Robida, and the smell of gunpowder hangs heavily in the air.

Luis Rosado, a 22-year-old, catches one of the bullets in his chest as he walks out of the restroom. He tries to crawl toward the door, toward safety, but he doesn’t have the strength and collapses.
Perry is no luckier. He’s reeling from the hatchet blow to his face—a strike that’s left a large flap of skin hanging limply, like a wind sock with no wind. Before he can escape, one of the bullets punctures his lower right back. It is a hot, stinging sensation, and there’s no mistaking it. As Perry falls to the floor, he knows he’s been shot. He decides to lie still—to play dead—hoping Robida won’t walk over and finish him. But he’s suffered hatchet and gunshot wounds, and he knows that’s not good. Before too long, he might not be playing dead, he might be dead.
He lays on the floor, blood rushing from his face and back, paralyzed by fear and pain. He lays there and thinks about the irony: Just a few hours earlier, he was content, he was happy, he felt safe here.
Robert Perry lays there with his eyes closed, and he waits to die.

PHILLIP DAGGETT doesn’t want to go back inside. Along with a few others, he’s managed to sneak out. But some weren’t so fortunate, and Daggett doesn’t want to leave his friends at the mercy of a maniac. Reluctantly, he opens the door to the bar.
Immediately, Robida is staring at him, cold and still. He’s only a few feet away and extends his arm, practically putting the gun’s tip to Daggett’s head. Then Robida pulls the trigger, and Daggett, like Perry, expects to die.
But there is only an empty click. No bullet. No deafening bang. No flash of white. Just the click of the hammer striking the empty chamber.

Robida leaves Daggett to process the unlikely turn and shoots past him up North Front Street, disappearing into the darkness from which he had emerged a half hour before. Daggett stands in disbelief, surrounded by blood and hysteria.
Within seconds of Robida fleeing, an officer arrives. Daggett tells him the assailant just left, that if the officer hurries he can apprehend Robida. The officer chooses, instead, to tend to the victims. The New Bedford Police Department later refers all questions about this to the Bristol County District Attorney, who says the officer acted properly. After all, the D.A. contends, no one died following the attack, and maybe that’s thanks to the officer coming to their aid. And, in fact, miraculously, all three victims—Perry, Rosado, and Taylor—though seriously injured, will live.

​
AFTER FLEEING Massachusetts in his green Pontiac Grand-Am, Robida contacts an ex-girlfriend in West Virginia. Her name is Jennifer Bailey. She has dark black hair, an easy smile, and big, soft eyes. She is 15 years older than Robida and has three kids. Despite that, after meeting on the Internet, the two had lived together in her apartment for about a year from February 2004 to February 2005. He was 17 when they broke up, and they remained in touch.

That’s the first thing Jake Jekyll does after the Puzzles attack—he goes looking for Jenny Manson. He heads south and west until he hits West Virginia, a wannabe Clyde hoping to enlist his Bonnie. The Charleston and New Bedford police departments and the West Virginia State Police all say it’s unclear whether Bailey went willingly. They say the facts could be interpreted in so many ways. But they all agree that, before driving off with Robida, Bailey leaves her kids at her mother’s house and withdraws $500 from the bank.

iloted by someone as incredibly dangerous as Jacob Robida, a man wanted by the authorities in Massachusetts and West Virginia. (Some media outlets speculate that Robida is in Arkansas to link up with hate groups, but the smart bet is that he’s running fast and scared, with no destination in mind.) All Sell knows is that the Grand-Am is moving, and he pulls the Pontiac over.
The video from Sell’s cruiser tells the rest: Officer Sell approaches the driver’s side window. The window rolls down and the driver hands Sell what appears to be a license. While Sell is looking it over, a gun peeks out and fires twice. Sell’s head snaps back, then he falls limply to the ground. The Grand-Am backs up, crashing into the patrol car, before driving out of the camera’s view. A few moments later, the Pontiac is back. Robida gets out and leans over the officer’s body. He picks something up off the ground, gets back in his car, and speeds away.
“It was his license,” the mayor says. “We think he went back to get his license.”

 and he’s made more trips to the emergency room than he cares to recount.
Bob Perry, meanwhile, has a jagged five-inch scar along the right side of his face that doubles as a constant reminder. (The other two victims, Taylor and Rosado, are also out of the hospital and recovering.) Like Daggett, Perry feels cheated that Robida is gone. He’ll always have terrible memories from that night, but he’ll never have answers.
“I was disappointed when I heard he killed himself,” Perry says. “You have to understand, I’m the most passive person in the world. At that time, I wasn’t feeling anger. I was confused. I couldn’t understand why he did this to us. I would have talked to Jacob if given the opportunity. I would have liked to talk to him.”

                                   Joseph Barboza Jr.  1932-1976                        
         Joseph Barboza (1932-1976) was born and raised in New Bedford. He was the son of Joseph Barboza Sr. (x-1981) and Palmeda Camille (1907-1973). Barboza had two brothers: Donald (1929-2015) and Anthony Barboza (1945-2022) and a sister, Anne (Barboza) Houghton.
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​Criminal History
    Barboza had minor scrapes with the law, but quickly escalated. By 1949, at age of 17, he led a gang that broke into homes and small businesses, stealing money, watches, liquor and guns. Sentenced to the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Concord State Prison for five (5) years in 1950. In 1953 Barboza led a wild jailbreak, he and six (6) other inmates overpowered four (4) guards and raced away in two (2) cars. They were later captured at a subway station in Revere less than 24 hours after the escape.

New England Mafia 
  The legendary encounter with a Patriarca crime family underboss at an East Boston bar in 1958, after Barboza was paroled from prison, really got him noticed. It also earned him the nickname “The Animal.”
   Barboza was drinking at a Boston-area bar patronized by organized crime figures when an elderly patron, upset by his obnoxious behavior, berated him for his rudeness. Barboza approached the older man and slapped him hard across the face. Sitting nearby, underboss Enrico "Henry" Tameleo (1901-1985) angrily shouted to Barboza “I don’t want you to ever slap that man. I don’t want you to touch anybody with your hands again.” Suddenly, Barboza leaned over and bit the man’s ear. “I didn’t touch him with my hands,” snarled Barboza.
    Barboza became connected with Vincent "The Bear" Flemmi and Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi who were directly tied the Whitey Bulger. Within a few years, he had become one of the mob’s most prolific serial contract killers.

Barboza Becomes Liability to New England Mafia 
     In October 1966, his falling out with the organized crime organization was clear after he and two others were arrested on weapons charges in Boston. His accomplices were released on bail, but Joseph had bail set at $100,000 which he couldn't afford. Nobody from the Patriarca crime family came to post his bail and he heard that it was the Mafia family who tipped off the police. The other two associates went to raise Joseph's bail. Five weeks later, after raising $59,000 the pair were murdered by hit-man Larry Zannino (1920-1996). Joseph became aware of the murders and vowed revenge, the $59,000 went missing.

FBI involvement  
   FBI agents Dennis Condon and H. Paul Rico were searching and recruiting informants, Joseph, stood out as the perfect candidate. In May 1967 Steve Flemmi met with Joseph and informed him that Gennaro Angiulo and his brothers had plans to murder him. In June 1967 Joseph became and FBI informant.  Joseph implicated Patriarca and Angiulo in separate murder conspiracies. In a third case, he covered for his friend, and Agent Rico’s snitch, James Flemmi implicating four innocent men (Peter Limone, Joe Salvati, Louis Greco and Emilio Tamileo) in the 1965 Edward Deegan murder. After providing all this information, Joseph became the first person to enter the Witness Protection Program.
     Out of the six people convicted for the murder, only Ronald Cassesso and Wilfred Roy French were actually involved and present in the alley where the murder took place. FBI agent Paul Rico had offered French and Cassesso leniency if they would corroborate Barboza's false testimony. Both French and Cassesso refused the offer. Cassesso died in prison 30 years later. French was finally freed 34 years later.
    Tameleo and Greco died in prison after serving almost 30 years, and Salvati and Limone were finally released in 1997 and 2001, respectively. The families of Greco, Tameleo, Salvati and Limone filed lawsuits totaling in excess of one billion dollars filed against the Federal government. In July 2007, U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner in Boston found the FBI helped convict the four men and the U.S. Government was ordered to pay $100 million in damages to the four defendants.

Witness Protection Program
     While the trials were in session, later found out that Francis "Cadillac Frank" Salemme and Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi planted a bomb under the hood of Joseph’s black Oldsmobile, which he had given to his attorney, John Fitzgerald, as payment for legal fees. Attorney Fitzgerald survived the blast but lost his right leg. 
  The bombing prompted federal officials to begin moving Joseph, now known by the code name “Baron” to secret locations with a platoon of armed Federal Agents, in a n effort to protect him from assassination by the Mafia.
    The government wouldn't protect him and his family unless agreed to testify. The government would also provided him up with his own restaurant and plastic surgery to change his appearance which would further protect him and and his family. Joseph went on the testify against Raymond Patriarca and many high-ranking members and associates of the New England family. His testimony resulted in indictments of several people in relation to murder cases. Patriarca and Henry Tameleo were indicted for conspiracy to murder in the 1966 killing of Providence bookmaker Willie Marfeo. 
   For his testimony, Joseph was given a one-year prison term, including time served. He was paroled in March 1969 under the name "Joseph Bentley" and was relocated to Santa Rosa California where he enrolled in a culinary arts school. Joseph was forever barred from living in Boston. 

Murder While in Witness Protection Program
      In 1970, Joseph (known as Bentley) murdered Clay Wilson (27), a bulldozer operator, but moonlighted as a criminal. Following a dispute with Clay, Joseph shot him twice in the back of the head-around the 5th or 6th of July 1970, and buried him in a grave in a forest near Glen Ellen.  He was also suspected in killing four others while he was on the federal witness protection program in California.
      Joseph claimed to have murdered twenty-nine (29) people in New England and five (5) people in California while on the Federal Witness Protection Program. 

The Miscarriage of Justice  
       ​In a separate murder case, Joseph lied under oath, at the request of FBI agents Condon and Rico, on the stand in state court against six defendants — all Mob associates — accused of the 1965 murder of Edward Teddy Deegan. State prosecutors, based almost solely on Barboza’s uncorroborated and perjured testimony, and unaware of the FBI’s actions, won convictions of the six men in Deegan’s murder, when none of the defendants in fact took part in the killing. The FBI and Barboza framed them. Two defendants received life sentences, the other four got the death penalty, although no one was executed.
    In exchange, the FBI protected Joseph's close friend, the veteran hitman, Jimmy “The Bear” Flemmi, from state murder charges in Deegan’s homicide. The FBI used Flemmi’s brother, hitman Steve “The Rifleman” Flemmi, to convince Barboza to perjure himself. Barboza consented, saying he would not provide information. 
    In 2002, the House Committee on Government Reform looked into the FBI’s use of Joseph, Jimmy Flemmi and other murderers as federal informants. In a scathing 1,800-page report released in 2004, the committee stated that Joseph and Jimmy Flemmi actually killed Deegan, but Hoover and the FBI, seeking to preserve both men within the new informant program to gain intelligence on the Mob, allowed the innocent defendants to take the fall.  

Barboza Murdered 1976 
   On February 11, 1976, Joseph was moved to Santa Rosa, California, under the name Joe Denati, scheduled a visit his old friend and Mob associate James Chalmas in San Francisco.  James Chalmas had arraigned to have Joseph killed. 
James had notified the Patriarca family underboss Gennaro “Jerry” Angiulo (1919-2009) of Joseph's upcoming visit.
     Jerry Angiulo sent Ilario M.A. Zannino (1920-1996) and Joseph Russo (1931-1998) to watch for when Joseph when he left James's residence. As Joseph approached his parked car and pulled out his key, a van rolled up and Zannino and Russo fired four (4) shotgun blasts at him through an open door.
     Joseph's murder remained unsolved from 1976 to 1981 until the FBI listened to secretly recorded conservations by Angiulo and Zannino in their social club.